


Come Home a Crying Memory

by OneofWebs



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bottom Gabriel (Good Omens), Crowley Has a Penis (Good Omens), Crowley's Fall (Good Omens), Depression, Falling In Love, First Time, Gabriel Has a Penis (Good Omens), Getting Back Together, Hand Jobs, Hurt/Comfort, Kissing, Love Confessions, M/M, Seraphim Crowley (Good Omens), Temporary Amnesia, Top Crowley (Good Omens), Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Unrequited Love, Virgin Gabriel (Good Omens), Visions in dreams
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-22
Updated: 2020-01-23
Packaged: 2021-02-24 17:54:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 28,797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22362040
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OneofWebs/pseuds/OneofWebs
Summary: Crowley doesn't remember much from before the Fall, and what he does remember is mostly plagued with visions and dreams of an angel whose face he can't remember and name he can't place. These dreams have been haunting him for thousands of years, and when the answer arrives right at his doorstep, he's less than likely to believe it.One thing Crowley knows for certain is that he didn't Fall; he was pushed.
Relationships: Crowley/Gabriel (Good Omens)
Comments: 20
Kudos: 65





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this in like 3 days in an illness induced fever dream, and then I edited (rested lol) on the 4th. That being said, this story was based on a concept that I've had for a long time based on the manner in which Crowley fell. It's gonna be a bit long, so I'll post half today and half tomorrow. It has been pre-tagged, though. No NSFW stuff until tomorrow. 
> 
> Gotta get through all the useless pining before we get NSFW stuff.

It was supposed to have been just like any other day, with no complications, expectations, or frustrations. Crowley had arrived just promptly after one-thirty in the afternoon to fetch Aziraphale for their weekly lunch. It was a thing done out friendship and kindness and _care_ , because they’d just survived an Apocalypse. It seemed only proper to keep up ties with someone he’d been fighting the end of the world with. Crowley _liked_ Aziraphale. He wanted to keep up contact. He wanted to do things like have lunch and see movies and stare at books.

Crowley had even started to eat food with Aziraphale. He enjoyed tea on a chilly, rainy afternoon. They’d spent days together in the shop with the fireplace going and books spread out. Aziraphale would read while Crowley napped or cleaned. Everything was routine and easy. Wonderful. _Simple_. Simple as it could be, anyway, with the remnants of things that stuck around here or there. Crowley had always had dreams of his past, and those lingered. The miracles and the immortality lingered.

_Feelings_ lingered. Just the wrong kinds of feelings.

Crowley collapsed down onto the sofa and rested his face in his hands. That hadn’t been the response Aziraphale was expecting. He’d been expecting joy, awe, wonderment. Anything other than Crowley collapsing in what appeared to be despair. Aziraphale wasn’t even sure what to do other than stand where he was, hands wrung together out in front of him. For all the time it had taken him the courage to say this, seeing Crowley react in such a way just left him feeling like a fool.

He’d told Crowley he _loved_ him. It had been a long winding speech about all of the things they’d been through together, all the moments they’d shared. Everything—from the Bastille, to the Blitz, to standing side by side in the face of Satan. Aziraphale had been afraid to say it sooner, but now, without Heaven and Hell breathing down their necks, he felt as if he could have said anything. And he’d said that. It’d been the most freeing thing he’d ever said, and Crowley had collapsed in despair.

“Crowley?” Aziraphale tried, after a long moment of silence. “I—I didn’t mean to upset you. In fact, it’s probably best you forget that I said anything. We—we don’t even have to go out for lunch, yes. I’m sure you’d like some time, well, away from me? Crowley?”

Crowley held up his hand. Aziraphale stopped rambling immediately and waited.

“I have…dreams,” Crowley started.

“Yes, you’ve told me about them. Have they gotten worse? Better? Perhaps more vivid? Do you remember anything?”

“Aziraphale, please,” Crowley sighed. He dropped his hands away from his face to wrap his arms around himself. Never before had Aziraphale ever seen Crowley looking so weak, vulnerable.

Aziraphale gave a subtle nod and dropped down to sit in his chair. He would wait as long as he needed to, to hear what Crowley had to say. Even if it took all day, he would wait.

“I haven’t told you about all of them. Feels like they’re all about my past, but some of them aren’t just about being an angel. There’s someone _with_ me. I can’t hear their voice or see their face, but they’re there. I can see them in hand touches and things. But when they talk, it’s like I hear myself. Does that make sense?”

Aziraphale nodded. “You don’t remember the sound, but you remember the words.”

“Yeah, yeah. Something like that. I don’t even remember all of the words, but I remember a few.”

“What are they? They seem to trouble you, greatly.”

Crowley scoffed. “That’s an understatement. Aziraphale, listen.” Crowley straightened up and scooted to the edge of the couch. He leaned forward enough to gawk about the air with where to put his hand, but he settled for Aziraphale’s knee with an awkward pat. “You’re everything to me. You are. And if I didn’t have these memories, I’d sweep you off into the sunset and make you the happiest angel I could. But I can’t do that knowing that this— _angel_ is still out there.”

Aziraphale gulped. “What are the words you remember, Crowley?”

“Aziraphale—angel, they _loved_ me. I can—I can see myself in the dreams, saying it back. I—” Crowley sighed, slumping over his knees. “I’m sorry, angel.”

Aziraphale offered a smile and his hand to the side of Crowley’s face. “Oh, my dear, do not be sorry. Thank you for telling me. Perhaps, I could aid in finding them? I knew a great deal of angels, you know.”

Crowley shook his head. “I can’t remember anything about them.”

Aziraphale’s smile faltered. “Would you still like to go to lunch, then? Or, perhaps, I can walk you back to your flat.”

Crowley just looked at Aziraphale for a long moment. A longer moment than perhaps necessary, but all he could do was stare. This is what his gut had told him to do, but was it the right thing to do? Crowley was only just coming to terms with the fact that a demon could love. He could love Aziraphale. He had, all these years. Even if the love was different from the love Aziraphale described, Crowley was sure he could be anything Aziraphale needed him to be. If that meant something closer to a partner than a friend, Crowley could do that.

And yet, these dreams were more a plague than a vague recollection. Would he really be able to be all those things to Aziraphale with these things haunting him? If he were to somehow find out that this angel in his dreams was dead or moved on, or had even forgotten him, then maybe. Aziraphale deserved better than that. He deserved someone who looked at him like he was the world and loved him, just the same. First place. Not a contingency plan. Crowley had already made his choice.

“Thank you, angel,” he said. “I’ll walk myself back. I’ll—I’ll give you a call.” Crowley smiled and hoped Aziraphale couldn’t see past it.

Aziraphale didn’t keep him there a moment longer. He didn’t so much as walk Crowley to the door, and Crowley didn’t blame him. Crowley had just shattered his heart. If they were ever the same after this, Crowley would be surprised. He would be surprised if he had the strength to call Aziraphale when he got home. Tomorrow. The week after. Ever again. Crowley didn’t think he’d ever be able to face Aziraphale for what he’d done. Even if Aziraphale hadn’t started to cry or absolutely collapsed, Crowley still knew that he’d hurt him.

The flat didn’t even feel the same. It felt empty, cold, and soulless. Aziraphale had things here. He had a coat, a scarf, and an entire bookshelf right there in Crowley’s study. There were even books on plants just scattered around in the plant room. Remnants of a life he could have had, if he’d been strong enough to look past these stupid dreams. For all he knew, this _angel_ in his dreams was dead, Fallen, or didn’t even know him, anymore. He was risking everything for the contrary.

But it was for the best. Aziraphale deserved someone better than him. Someone who wasn’t willing to risk a life of happiness on something stupid like a _dream_. Even the plants leaned in to judge him as he walked through. Crowley, for once, didn’t have anything to say to them. He could shout and scream, all he wanted, and what would it change? The gaping hole in his chest? No. Nothing would fix that. Not unless he could rewind time or find this angel.

He was just looking for punishment when he stepped into his bedroom and shed his clothes. Sleeping was the worst plan he could have. He was running from his problems into _more_ problems. Would he dream of that angel, again? Would he just let himself be plagued by the angel in his dreams? He’d spend the rest of his life dreaming of a being he couldn’t remember in turn for the life he _could_ _’ve_ had. He wasn’t sure which option was better: the one where he was miserable or the one where he pretended not to be.

Crowley pulled on his black, silken pajamas before he turned off the light and crawled right into bed. It was two in the afternoon, and he figured there was nothing better to do than to spend the rest of his night alone and asleep. He’d already messed up everything he had going for him, so he might as well ruin the rest of his day, too. He knew that if he fell asleep, he would see that angel again. Maybe he would see that angel, again, for the rest of his life, and never knew who they were. A fitting punishment for what he’d done to the angel he already had.

_Crowley walked through a_ door, but that was all he’d known. He didn’t know the room from whence he came or the room he stood on, only that it was a wobbly, fake sort of feeling where the walls around him might have closed in, all on their own. The pillars and the floor were made of a white he didn’t know, material he didn’t recognize, like the world around him had come to a crashing halt of change. His legs were about to take the same route, like he’d never walked this way before. With two legs. Something about the legs.

The hall before him was entirely empty, devoid of things but the white and the creeping stillness. As he walked along the length of it, it felt as though it grew and grew. The opening at the end was something he might only reach in the dream of a dream, but it came soon enough. Crowley stumbled right at the top of it and barely managed to catch himself before he went tumbling down. It would have been a long way to fall, and the stairs did not even connect. They glowed and shimmered like the stuff of stars—and stars hadn’t yet been created. The world was dark, and all the light was here.

It was Heaven. Of course, the halls were light with Love and with Grace. Crowley must have been one of those same things, but it thrummed differently in his chest like something was off, something was wrong. He couldn’t remember where he’d come from, but the door hadn’t been easy to push through. He wasn’t supposed to be here, and he remembered nothing before crossing the door. It was the first decision he’d ever made as himself, apart from the whole. The first decision of this new identity, this slightly wrong thing.

He decided, secondly, to brave the stairs. Even if his knees wobbled under their own newness, he would brave the stairs and see what lie beyond. Each step felt like a drain, though. A swirling bit of light and something darker all together, again and again, as Crowley’s feet touched the stairs, one by one. He had to hold onto the wall to steady himself on each stair, but he descended. He descended. It felt like something left each farther stair he dropped, but Crowley kept going.

There were more stairs than there was space in the world to hold stairs. The downward hall went on for ages, before time had even folded itself properly to work on such a scale of ages and centuries. Crowley was an angel, and angels had only existed for what must have been minutes. That would explain why he didn’t know how to walk, as he did not know the proper explanation. He couldn’t _remember_.

When he finally found the bottom of the stairs in a boiling mass of more white, Crowley’s knees buckled beneath him as if pulled by an unseen force. It felt as if a part of him had stayed on that staircase. It would return back up the stairs, like a ghost, that Crowley saw when he glanced over his own shoulder and disappear. Crowley would never find that piece of himself, and he would never know why he could see it when no one else did. Or if it was just a dream. He’d imagined it all in just the strange, wobbly fear of doing something he knew he shouldn’t have been.

Crowley finally looked up when there was a grip on his arm. The whole room was filled with angels, all just like he was. They had bodies, two arms, two legs, and were dressed in beautifully draped and folded robes. The robes were all white with the same purity as the color of the walls. Of all of them, a large handful in which Crowley could only assume exceeded twenty, only one of them had taken notice away from their work to see him collapse at the bottom of the stairs.

This angel had a face, but it wasn’t one that Crowley could recognize. The name wasn’t there, and the angel didn’t introduce himself, like he just assumed that Crowley would know him. Crowley didn’t know a thing about him, save that his hair was dark, and his eyes were a sparkling gold.

“Hey, let’s get you up,” the dark-haired angels said, pulling Crowley up to his feet. He still wobbled, and the angel didn’t feel _real_ beneath his hands, but he held onto him, anyway. “Hey,” the dark-haired angel called, “we got an upstairs visitor!”

That gathered the attention of all the angels, then, in a sudden snap. There had been no eyes on Crowley, and now there were more eyes than he could count. Staring at him. Glaring at him. Faces and angels he couldn’t recognize, yet somehow, felt like he knew them all. Even the angels with faces not left blurry and undefined had no names, but Crowley was bombarded by such painful familiarity that he thought he might even hug them. All of it was unreal and strange. He didn’t belong here with these angels.

“From upstairs?” this voice caught Crowley’s attention faster than anything, because it was _his_ voice. But he wasn’t the one talking.

This angel’s face blurred and undefined beyond recognition. Crowley could barely see the lines of expressions. They didn’t have a voice, either. They spoke in Crowley’s own, and how was that possible? Everything from the twinge of his accent to the inflection of his words, this angel would have Crowley’s exact voice, speaking lines that Crowley would never say, but exactly how he would say them if he was the one speaking. Nothing else about this angel was recognizable—their height, their eye color, their _skin_ color. It all shifted and changed in a whirlwind of identities.

“Nobody is supposed to come from upstairs,” the faceless angel continued. “He should not be down here, and you would do well to send him right back on his way.”

“Oh, calm down,” said the dark-haired angel. “He’s obviously just a bit lost. Wouldn’t be right of us to send him back on his way without help.”

“We are not to go up those stairs either, and you know this, —” the voice cut out in a strange bit of static before the name was said. Crowley couldn’t help but stare.

Something wasn’t right, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it. The faceless and the nameless angels didn’t seem to bother him, but the static in the air and the strange feeling. It was constricting, suffocating. And Crowley couldn’t quite place what the problem was. Only that he wasn’t supposed to be here. This angel, without a face or a voice, was right. But somehow, Crowley couldn’t get his legs to move. He couldn’t go in the direction he wanted to. He went forward, when he meant to turn around and disappear altogether.

“He can stick around,” the dark-haired angel laughed. By this point, he didn’t have to help Crowley stand. Crowley had walked up to the big white table in the middle of the room all on his own. The dark-haired angel was leaning against the table, his arms crossed and a smirk on his face.

“If you suppose this is wise,” the faceless angel said, in Crowley’s voice. “It wouldn’t hurt to have some new company around here,” and a laugh. A warm laugh that wasn’t anything like Crowley’s. It was something that Crowley could remember.

“What do you do, down here?” Crowley asked, though it didn’t feel as though his lips were the ones moving. Still, he spoke. His voice.

“Oh, we do a lot of things,” Crowley’s voice responded. “There are a lot of plans in the making, right now. The Almighty is starting something grand. She calls it _the universe_ and has asked for our assistance. Would you like to see those plans?”

Crowley nodded.

The explanation sounded horrifically like celestial harmonies, ones that sprung deep in the back of Crowley’s skull like something that he remembered but couldn’t quite place. He could somehow see the faceless angel talking, through the dusty wind of their face, but the noise that it made. The harmonies overwhelmed the voice the angel should have spoken with, a voice just as misplaced as the face, the name, and the things they were talking about.

This faceless angel was excited to share these plans, but even as Crowley looked at the paper spread out over the table, he couldn’t understand a thing. Like a language that he’d forgotten, he looked at it like it was something he should know, but nothing connected, and nothing computed. Nothing but the way that it felt. The sparkle of it, the shine. Somewhere, Crowley could know the things the faceless angel said and revel in how excited they were to share with someone new.

In their excitement, the faceless angel reached out to put their hand on Crowley’s shoulder. There was such a sudden rush of _warmth_ through Crowley’s body that he jolted. The faceless angel’s hand fell away, and they stared at each other for a long moment.

“I apologize,” the faceless angel said. “I should have asked first.”

“No—no, it’s fine,” Crowley assured. “It’s alright. I wasn’t expecting it. You shocked me. I’m not used to it.”

Neither of them commented on how long the dark-haired angel had touched Crowley. It certainly couldn’t be that Crowley wasn’t used to touch or that the idea of it disgusted him. Though, there were no other reasons, for the moment. For what might have been brewing up in the white, static spaces between them wasn’t something too widely understood. They were, after all, _no more than a few minutes old._

Crowley jolted awake as if he’d just had a nightmare and not some pleasant dream about Heaven. It was the most vivid, the _realest_ version of that, dream he’d ever had. It was like he was there, back in Heaven. He could feel the ground beneath his feet, the robes against his skin. The _touch_ that _that_ angel had given him. The only angel he knew better than _that_ angel was Aziraphale, and even then, there was a difference in margin. Crowley could have listed Aziraphale’s name and every feature on his face.

This angel was a mystery. Were they dead? Were they a demon? Had they Fallen in the war and turned into someone so unrecognizable that Crowley knew them and _hated_ them? There were so many possibilities that Crowley wasn’t sure what to do with himself, save sitting around and worrying about it. Fearing it. Wondering where he’d gone wrong. If he really loved this angel, how could he have forgotten about them?

He sighed and grumbled to himself, rolling out of bed. He needed a shower. He needed to take care of his plants. He needed to get something warm into his system before he froze to death. A nice hot shower, a nice hot cup of coffee, and everything would be fine. Crowley could put this behind him and start looking for a new place to live—there was no way he could ever face Aziraphale again, after what he’d said. Continuing on like friends didn’t feel like something he deserved.

Crowley left a trail of clothes behind him as he stepped into the bathroom. The water was a scalding hot temperature, just like it always was, and he scrubbed a little hard at his skin until he was a peachy, raw color. Then, all he bothered with was a towel around his waist. He’d clean up later, when he started packing for his inevitable disappearance. That might have been a little bit dramatic, but he couldn’t fathom a reason to stay, if he couldn’t see Aziraphale. New friends, new life, and new coffee, maybe.

Crowley grimaced as he drank the sludge. He really needed to replace his beans, every now and again. Or work in, maybe, doing a better job at making it. He wasn’t paying attention. He was too busy brooding, because what else was he supposed to do? He remembered the very first time he’d ever had this dream, and he’d tried to _draw_ what the angel looked like. Stupid. He was stupid. He would drink the rest of his awful sludge and figure the rest of it out, from there.

All he knew was that he couldn’t call Aziraphale. He couldn’t go back to the shop. And that left very few places for him to go. He might try the park. It wasn’t a bad place to go to clear his head. He could feed the ducks that new seed stuff they sold to keep people from throwing bread. Maybe he could take a walk around the park and come back with a new perspective on the great Hell that he’d put himself into. It was all going to be okay, and he was going to see that. With enough perspective sprinkled into his life, everything was going to be alright.

Crowley took his time picking out something to wear, because he had to look his best for the ducks. Looking his best was a good, solid road back to feeling like half of a proper being, again. He’d put on a fine silk shirt with his silk tie, all very open and loose because he wasn’t about to go against his brand. The jacket and the jeans were very carefully picked out, and then, the snakeskin boots put on. His sunglasses were sitting on the nightstand, and with those, he felt as if he could face the world.

He wouldn’t even take the Bentley! If this was about clearing his head, then he would walk all the way to the park. Then, he would walk through the park. Maybe, if he found a nice bench to sit down on that wasn’t the bench he always sat at with Aziraphale, he might even sit down to try and clear his head. Many ways to clear the head, there were. Crowley was going to find each and every one of them, and then list them in a nice, alphabetized order so he could lament over them, again.

None of it was going to work, and he knew that, but grumbling along the sidewalk as he skulked down to the park did seem like a good thing to put on the list. With the right miracle and a little thing in his ear, nobody even stared at him. It was like he was talking on the phone, but he was grumbling to himself.

The nap had only made things worse. He knew it would, but he’d gone and done it anyway. The dream had been expected, but for the dream to be that _clear_. That dark-haired angel was a face he’d never seen in any dream, and he could even still vividly see some of the other faces in the room. One of them had been _Michael_ , for Hell’s sake. How could he have ever been expected to know that? It didn’t even make sense. From what he knew of Heaven and the stupid floors, there’s no way he would have ever gone _downstairs_ and seen an _Archangel_.

He just didn’t remember enough to put the pieces together. As far as he’d ever known, he was just some angel. Just some nobody who’d gotten the grand chance to help paint the sky with stars. And even then, he hadn’t been the _only_ one to make stars. He’d helped. Big whoop. There were plenty of angels who did plenty of things that made them bigger and better than Crowley ever was. Most notable thing he ever did was become a demon. Except, apparently, he’d been notable enough for one of those angels to love him, and then he’d gone and forgotten everything about them by doing the only notable thing he ever did.

Some angel he was. Some _demon_ , too. He could only imagine what Hell would think if he was still anyway, at all, associated with them. For a demon to be so caught up on love that he was losing his veritable mind was unheard of. Demons weren’t even supposed to be _able_ to love. Crowley could argue that these were visions from a time when he could love, but the feelings hadn’t died with the details. Unless these emotions were just remembered, Crowley could still feel that warm ping in his chest.

He just wished he knew who it belonged to. That’s what love was, wasn’t it? Giving the heart to someone? Had Crowley really handed his off and then forgot where he left it?

St. James’ Park was busy, when Crowley arrived. It didn’t deter him from his first step right through the grass, before he found the pathway. It wasn’t exactly a warm or sunny day in London, but there were still food carts out and children running around. A darker, gloomier day might have been a better time to go on a walk for head clearing, but Crowley couldn’t fathom the horrible cliché it would have made. This wasn’t, by any means, a quiet time, but he would take his walk, anyway. It wasn’t worth going all the way home.

Crowley shoved his hands into his pockets and kicked a rock on his way down the sidewalk. There might as well have been a cloud following him for how miserable he was sure he looked, but what else was he supposed to do? Was he supposed to just wave his hand about and suddenly be happy? That seemed a bit far-fetched and just stupid enough to work, but Crowley was sure that he _deserved_ to feel like this. It wasn’t just for having hurt Aziraphale, anymore, either. He could only imagine the potential possibilities of what he’d done to this angel. None of them were good.

Eventually, Crowley dug his phone out of his pocket, so he had something better to do than walk around looking as terrifying as possible. At least, on his phone, he was more than a brooding demon. He could poke through his contacts, of which he only had seven, and look at Aziraphale’s number. He could press the little, green call button and invite Aziraphale out for dinner, while there was still time. He could solve everything with one little conversation—or he could do exactly nothing.

There wasn’t even time enough to put his phone away before he was colliding with someone, right in the middle of the sidewalk. Crowley stumbled back, _they_ stumbled back, and Crowley’s phone shattered on the sidewalk. He really should have invested in a phone that _wouldn_ _’t_ do that, but nothing a small miracle wouldn’t hurt. Not that he’d thought about that in the moment. What he wanted to do was shout and scream at the person he’d smacked face first into, but he had been the one not watching where he was going.

When he looked up at the other, they were staring right at him. Eyes wide. _Purple_ eyes, wide. Wearing that stupid, stuck up white turtleneck with his _stupider_ lavender coat and the _stupidest_ scarf wrapped around his neck. Crowley was looking at Gabriel. Out of any other person he could have run into—it was Gabriel. It had to be Gabriel.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TWO CHAPTERS FOR THE DAY THAT'S ALL WE _GET_ tomorrow it will be juicy and dramatic huehue

Gabriel had never had much free time, but that was just the way that he preferred it. That wasn’t to say that he didn’t have free time, at all, it was just that the moments he had were generally filled with more work. Different types of work. He didn’t like to find himself sitting around and doing nothing of importance. It wasn’t that free time made him feel empty; as if there wasn’t anything more to life than work. Work was just something to keep his mind off of things, and he’d had a lot of things on his mind since the dawn of time.

One of those things that he was supposed to be doing was keeping an eye on their Earth operative—Aziraphale. He had, cordially, passed that off for Michael to handle. Maybe Michael was in charge of the angels and the armies, but in the office, Gabriel had control of things. She would do what he asked, especially when he asked so nicely. Gabriel did just have those types of smiles. He hadn’t wanted to spend the most of his time looking at stills and videos of Aziraphale, after all.

Gabriel had spent thousands of years looking at just one thing. They were sills and videos, just like the other Archangels got to watch, but they were watching on order and for good reason. Gabriel was watching in his free time, the little bit that he got that he filled with more _work_. Anyone who would ask would hear that he was catching up on the day’s reports, looking through the information everyone had turned in from a hard day. Nobody did ask, but Gabriel always had a contingency plan.

If word ever made it up to the Almighty that Gabriel was spending his time on _personal_ things, She might have something to say. It wasn’t as if She frowned upon the angels having their own interpersonal relationships, this was just a particular relationship that had never been welcomed. Angels were beings of Love, but that Love was directly focused towards the Almighty and Her creations. To focus it towards the self and to other angels was near sin, and She wouldn’t allow her favorites to sin.

Gabriel had, thousands of years ago, tested his relationship with God. He knew that he should have left it there, but he hadn’t. He couldn’t. It had been the one moment in his existence that he looked back on with such a joyous warmth that letting it go seemed a fate worse than death, worse than Falling. He tried not to think about the fact that he had already let it go, but that was something dark and something past. He would look to the future, instead.

God trusted him, implicitly, to do what was right. In doing so, She had given Gabriel all the time he needed to learn how to lie and learn how to do it convincingly. As far as he knew, there were no other angels who could lie as well as he, and that was how he intended to keep it. If they didn’t know how to lie, they wouldn’t catch him in his own. His relationship with the Almighty was saved, and he may very well have a chance to save _this_ relationship. The one that he’d lost.

For six-thousand years, Gabriel had been watching the demon Crowley, from the first moment he’d met Aziraphale on the wall, up until Gabriel had had to go to Earth, himself, in attempts to restart the Apocalypse. When there was no way for that to happen, Gabriel had gone right back to what he was doing. Just in time to watch Aziraphale and Crowley clink glasses in the Ritz, like they were in love. Gabriel had tried to deny it, but he’d seen it. He’d seen all of it.

He’d seen the way Crowley came to Aziraphale’s rescue at the drop of a hat. He’d seen the way that Crowley put himself in danger to ensure Aziraphale was safe. Each time, it had hurt him on some deeper level than he knew what to deal with, but he’d been able to deny it as friendly things. Things that they’d learned from the humans that Gabriel would never understand. The Ritz had been the thing to kill his illusion. He’d wanted to believe that, somewhere, Crowley was still in love with him.

All at once, that reality had come back in trickling, shiny pieces, like hope. Gabriel had been there to watch it, because he couldn’t let go. He didn’t know how to let go. There was too much guilt and love and feeling to let go that quickly, and then it had all come waltzing back in. No apologies necessary. Gabriel had watched the exact moment Crowley told Aziraphale _no_ , because there was someone in his dreams that was keeping him from finding fulfillment anywhere else.

That had been all Gabriel needed for that unwanted, unruly little spark of hope to reignite itself. What if Crowley remembered him? Finally? After six-thousand and some odd years, what if Crowley _remembered_ him? And not in the way that he would from the Apocalypse and from Aziraphale’s, no doubt, unkind tales. What if Crowley remembered the time when they were something, when they mattered? From when he was an angel? It couldn’t possibly be true, and Gabriel would hate the living second that he’d ever thought differently.

Crowley hadn’t known his own memories for thousands of years. Gabriel had never seen an indication, otherwise. Why now? It was impossible. That would be too good to be true. Too good for Gabriel. He’d bartered everything, thousands of years ago, and lost it all for the sake of his relationship with the Lord. If his relationship with _Crowley_ hadn’t mattered then, why would it matter now? He’d thrown it all away, hadn’t he? But there was still a sparkling, shining bit of hope that made Gabriel remember what it was like.

Oh, he remembered what it was like when they were together. The first angels to ever turn their Love away from God and point it towards each other. It had been wonderful, truly. Gabriel couldn’t remember a moment, since, that he’d been as happy, calm, or content. Everything had been so bright, back then, when he was young and stupid. When he’d been no more than a few minutes old. Things had changed, since then, but that young Gabriel was still in him, hoping that this was good enough to _be_ true.

Only, it wasn’t. Gabriel had let that young, stupid part of him talk him into dropping everything he’d been working on to come straight to Earth. It was a stupid excitement, but it hadn’t died. This wasn’t real. Crowley hadn’t turned Aziraphale down because he loved Gabriel—he’d turned Aziraphale down because he had vague memories some which way about something at some time with someone. Gabriel didn’t factor in. Gabriel _couldn_ _’t_ factor in. Aziraphale had no doubt told many unpleasant stories to a newly born demon about his superior that would have killed his chance to factor in.

Crowley couldn’t love Gabriel because Crowley hated Gabriel. But just as Gabriel had this younger, stupider version of himself flitting around with bad ideas, he might have thought that Crowley still had that angel somewhere inside of him. If Gabriel could find that angel, maybe Crowley would remember him, but it felt strange. It’d felt like such an easy thing to do. Come to Earth. Find Crowley. Tell him what happened—but this wasn’t an angel. Suddenly, it was as if that angel’s name had died on his lips. A demon wasn’t worthy of an angel’s name, said the older, just as stupid version of Gabriel.

He was face to face with that Crowley, in the middle of a park sidewalk, and he was regretting every decision he’d made that had led him to this. Crowley looked at him with _disgust_. Crowley wasn’t looking at a Gabriel that he knew or loved, he was looking at a Gabriel who’d said cruel worlds to his friend and attempted to restart the end of the word, and for what purpose? This Gabriel, to that Crowley, was the very definition of an adversary.

“Didn’t you fucks say you were going to leave us alone?” Crowley sneered. “If you want Aziraphale—”

“I came here for you,” Gabriel said, and he was just as shocked as Crowley was. That wasn’t a good way to start this.

“I’m sorry, do you want to run that by me again? Maybe don’t, though, okay?” Crowley held up his hand and smiled. “I’m not going with you anymore than Aziraphale would.”

“We don’t have to _go_ anywhere. Crowley, listen to me—” Gabriel made a mistake.

Gabriel reached out and grabbed Crowley’s arm, just as he made way to turn and stalk off. He shouldn’t have. He knew he shouldn’t have. What did he have to say? And more so, what of it did Crowley have to listen to? None of it. Crowley had every right to do what he did: wrench his arm out of Gabriel’s grasp and stumble backwards.

“Don’t _touch_ me,” Crowley hissed.

“Will you listen to me, for just a moment?” Gabriel tried, more forceful this time. “We don’t have to shout at each other in front of all these—” he gestured outward, “—people.”

Crowley folded his arms and frowned. “What makes you think I want to hear anything you have to tell me?”

“Because you haven’t left yet,” Gabriel challenged.

“I think I just tried to, but someone got a little grabby. This time—” Crowley took one long step back before he started to walk off.

“Wait a minute!”

Gabriel pushed after Crowley. The entire scene was ridiculous. He was an Archangel chasing a demon—he was better than this. And still, nothing in his power would beg his body to stop. He went after Crowley until it was social convention had Crowley slowing down. He had to weave his way through one of those last-minute lines for the food cart before it was too dark to really justify being out and about like this. That was when Gabriel managed to catch him again, taking Crowley by the arm and dragging him off to the grass.

It was the fact that Crowley hadn’t immediately miracled himself away that left Gabriel with a bit of hope that this was the right thing to do. Maybe, in reality, it was because performing a miracle in front of a whole host of people wasn’t exactly a good idea, but Gabriel’s human skills weren’t entirely refined. He was ready to grasp onto anything that would reaffirm his believe that Crowley had to know him, somewhere. Gabriel was desperate. Archangels weren’t supposed to be desperate.

“Get your hands off me,” Crowley snapped, wrenching his arm back.

“You know me, Crowley. Why don’t you just remember it?” Gabriel asked. He moved like he would grab Crowley again, but caught himself midair. He seemed to curse under his breath.

“Know you? I know you’re a giant prick. What do you want from me?”

Gabriel shoved his fists into his pockets and tried to collect himself. “It’s not what I want from you,” he said, nodding towards Crowley. “I know things about your past. I was hoping you’d remember enough of it.”

Crowley snorted. “My past? About what, being an angel? Or is this some sort of weird thing that’s happening to catch me off guard?”

“Nothing like that, you have my word.”

“What good is that? I think the last thing _your word_ got done was ordering to have Aziraphale killed.”

“And he survived.”

“The lot of you said you’d leave us alone after that, and look what I run into? Lone Archangel lost his way back to heaven, did he?”

“Will you shut up and listen to me?” Gabriel grumbled. “We _knew_ each other.”

Crowley held up his hand. “I don’t care. Get lost, you wanker. And if I _ever_ see you again, I’m—fuck, I don’t know. But I’ll do something,” and it was a promise as much as it was a threat.

Gabriel didn’t have a word to keep either of them there, after that. Crowley obviously wasn’t anywhere closer to remembering than he’d been the moment that he forgot, and Gabriel wasn’t in any sort of mindset to make him remember. The park wasn’t a good place to do this, anyway. He should have had more tact, but he’d left Heaven in such a hurry that Gabriel had had no choice but to drop down into the park. That’s where Crowley had been. And he was, upon reflection of their argument, just Crowley.

That angel that Gabriel missed so badly may not even be there, anymore, at all.

Gabriel opted for just sitting down on the closest park bench and rubbing his nose between his fingers. Would that have actually helped his stress or not was unknown, but he’d seen humans doing it before and thought that, maybe, he could give a try. This whole thing was a mess, and it was a mess that he couldn’t fix. Somewhere, he knew it was his own folly that was causing this. If he’d just had the strength to shout Crowley’s _real_ name, maybe that would have been enough for him to remember. But Gabriel couldn’t see that real name in him, anymore.

That name belonged to an angel with long, tightly curled red hair and bright golden eyes. The snake thing had always been a part of Crowley, but there had been time it wasn’t a brand of shame on the side of his face. It had been a mark of honor. After all, snakes had to have come from somewhere. Crowley had just been the first snake without legs. That had been the mark of shame and the death of who Crowley had been.

If Gabriel couldn’t find the connection, maybe he would never find who Crowley _used_ to be. Gabriel’s feelings had not changed even once, since he’d been watching. He knew everything that Crowley had done, and still, he only longed to have him back. If Gabriel had been anyone else, he might have realized that that meant he didn’t need to find who Crowley used to be, only had to accept who he was. Gabriel didn’t know how to come to that conclusion, and all he managed to do was lean back onto the bench and fold his arms.

Crowley, on the other hand, went straight back to his flat. He was going to do something that Crowley never had—he was going to eat an entire tub of ice cream and watch rerun movies on his television in the lounge. This would be the sort of night where he called Aziraphale up and asked if he wanted to go to some late-night thing together to waste time before he was ready to pass off to sleep again, but there was still that nagging thought in his head that he had burned that bridge forever.

This new and certainly less improved Crowley was going to drown his time out with old movies and ice cream, because that was what humans did. This new and certainly less improved Crowley wasn’t feeling much like a demon, an angel, or anything strangely stuck between. Human it was. Maybe he’d even complete the night with one pathetic, depression induced rub off. Humans did that too. Crowley always thought it made them a little sad, but he’d also never had an issue finding a partner to _do_ that with.

Crowley could have any human that he wanted. And yet, somehow, the only people he was left with were two angels, equally obnoxious in their own ways. Crowley loved Aziraphale, and he’d always love Aziraphale. It just wasn’t the right kind of love for either of them. But Gabriel? Come marching down from Heaven like he was the biggest solution to every single one of Crowley’s problems? Crowley would rather sleep with a rock, honestly. A nice, sentient rock.

The movie of choice that evening was _Legally Blonde_. The ice cream of choice was an entire gallon of rocky road. Crowley had tried it once before and quickly deemed it the only ice cream he would _ever_ eat. Aziraphale preferred something lighter—strawberry cheesecake ice cream. Crowley didn’t hate cheesecake, but he needed to be as far away from Aziraphale as possible. That meant heavy, chocolaty, and crunchy ice cream. It also meant the movie and wearing his pajamas.

_There were the stairs again_ , wobbling just out of reach until Crowley was ready to reach it. There was something holding hard in the back of his mind that seemed to make this first hall, after that first door, impossibly long. Someone must have gotten after him for the times before he’d disappeared down those stairs, and something inside of him was telling Crowley that he’d done this several times, by now. Because he was going down these stairs with an unknown excitement, _warmth_.

By the time he reached the stairs, working past that something-something fear that he was doing something wrong, the stairs were short. He didn’t trip, anymore. He didn’t wobble. His legs were strong enough and used to this enough to carry him right down. Once, it had seemed like there were thousands and thousands of stairs. Now, it was like there was only seven. Crowley all but pranced down them like there should have birds and singing going on just behind. It was stupid. He shouldn’t have been this happy. Crowley couldn’t _remember_ a time that he was this happy.

He had definitely done this before, even as it felt strange and unfamiliar when Crowley stepped down off the final stair. There, somehow, seemed less angels in the room. Crowley didn’t notice, because his focus had only ever been for one of them: that faceless angel who spoke in his own voice, who was always so concerned with the blank pages and the out-sung words of a _plan_. Crowley didn’t know about any plan, but he was learning. This faceless angel was telling him everything that they could.

Oh, Crowley had something inside of him for this faceless angel, and it made him _warm_. Especially when he stepped down and his very presence seemed to draw the faceless angel to him. They’d looked away from everything in that exact moment that Crowley’s feet touched the cold ground, and everything was _wonderful_. If there hadn’t been eyes in that room, the faceless angel would have run to him. They had plans. Oh, they had plans. Crowley was definitely a little early, but he’d been sure it would have taken him longer to work up the courage to walk down those stairs, again.

“Oh, you’re back, already?” a voice from the side. Crowley looked, and it was the dark-haired angel with the same golden eyes that he had. This angel threw his arm around Crowley’s shoulder and jostled him.

“I’m early, aren’t I?” Crowley spoke. It was still, after all this time, like hearing his own voice but not feeling the movement of his lips.

“Just a bit. Don’t worry, things are still in order.”

The dark-haired angel pulled Crowley off to the side, having pointed out how the faceless angel had quickly returned to work like they were trying to hide their excitement at Crowley’s arrival. There was still work to do, and Crowley had come too early. Too early. Too early.

“You get chewed out, yet?” The dark-haired angel asked, laughing.

“Yeah,” Crowley responded, though he’d wanted to say something different. He didn’t remember getting yelled at, but he must have been, right? That would be the only explanation for his answer, even if there wasn’t a memory to back it up. Just an empty expanse of more things Crowley couldn’t place.

“Probably best to keep the whole thing on the down-low, you know?”

“Keep _what_ on the down-low?” Crowley asked, his nose wrinkling.

“Exactly.” The dark-haired angel winked, as if the confusion on Crowley’s face was a cleverly masked disguise and not actual confusion.

As far as Crowley was concerned, there wasn’t anything to keep on the downlow. There wasn’t anything to hide. Everyone else seemed to think there was something to hide, but as far as this Crowley could remember, there wasn’t anything to _hide_. Warmth wasn’t a bad thing, was it? He couldn’t put a name on this thing buzzing inside of him, and so what was the point of hiding something he couldn’t put a name on? He had been yelled at, sure—apparently—but not for the way he was looking at that faceless angel.

Crowley did remember, now, that he wasn’t supposed to have ever gone down those stairs. That’s what he’d been yelled at for. Don’t mingle. Don’t go down the stairs. Stick to your room. Stick to your duty. Don’t waver from it. That’s exactly what Crowley was doing, and he would get in trouble again. And again. And again. He would never regret it, because he got to see that smile on the faceless angel’s face. It was like he could see it, remember the way that it felt, without ever remembering the way that it looked.

“I think you’re crazy,” Crowley responded. “There’s nothing to hide.”

The dark-haired angel snorted. “Keep telling yourself that, bud. You’ll figure it out, eventually. When you do, you’ll see why things can get rough.”

Crowley eyed him strangely. What did that mean?

“You’re not the only one who gets in trouble, bud,” the dark-haired angel laughed. “I think I’ve got the record. Word around the street is that I’m the _favorite_ , since the Almighty hasn’t kicked me right off the clouds, yet.”

“Kicked you—what do you mean?” Crowley’s nose crinkled.

The dark-haired angel shrugged. “Probably nothing to worry about. Some of the angels are figuring out how to be angry, you know? Don’t like it when the betters get treated better.”

“And are you?” Crowley snorted. “Better, I mean?”

“Me? Yeah, of course. We’re _Archangels_ , bud. You might be the best, though.” The dark-haired angel nudged his fist into Crowley’s shoulder. And Crowley still didn’t know what it all meant.

Crowley waited, idly, while the faceless angel finished their work. He spent that time talking with the dark-haired angel, who seemed to have a whole plethora of strange ideas. He was talking about things that Crowley didn’t understand, like _demons_ and things where his voice cut out in a high-pitched shrill where Crowley couldn’t place the concept or the ideal. None of it seemed very _good_ , mind. Most of it seemed, in fact, rather bad. That wouldn’t have been an issue if Crowley didn’t remember agreeing with it.

When the faceless angel was finished with their work, they approached Crowley and his dark-haired friend. There was nothing on their face and nothing in their voice, but Crowley remembered the overbearing dread of a deep scowl. The faceless angel didn’t like what they were talking about and reached down, immediately, to pull Crowley off the floor and _into their side_. The dark-haired angel snorted from the floor, like he was right and there was something to hide.

“Stop poisoning him with your awful ideas,” the faceless angel chided, in Crowley’s voice. Because Crowley couldn’t remember their voice.

“They’re not awful! You’re just a paper-pushing stick in the mud,” the dark-haired angel replied. “If you knew how to have a little _fun_ ,” he said, pulling himself off the ground, “you and the bud here might even have a better time. What are you two even doing?”

“We’re going on a tour.”

“A tour!” The dark-haired angel laughed. “Well damn, —, and you think my ideas are bad? Poor bud’s already getting yelled at for all this stuff, and you think it’s good to take him on a tour?”

The faceless angel frowned. They had _good_ frowns. The dark, scary type that really should have shut anyone up. The dark-haired angel just laughed in response.

“Go on, then. Have fun, you kids. Bring him home before dark,” the dark-haired angel joked, and the faceless one rolled their eyes.

“Does it get dark in Heaven?” Crowley asked.

“No,” the faceless angel assured. “He’s just being an—, an—”

“Say it,” he challenged.

“An ass,” the faceless one frowned.

Even Crowley laughed, at that. “Come on, —, we have to go,” he urged, wrapping his hands around the faceless angel’s arm. He didn’t know the name, though. Couldn’t place it. Locked away with the face.

The faceless angel dragged them off, and Crowley offered an idle wave back to the dark-haired angel—who he was able to well assume, now, was his friend. The faceless angel had promised to take Crowley on a tour of Heaven, the places that he hadn’t seen that these _Archangels_ were allowed to go, based on their station alone. These weren’t things that Crowley had ever seen, and the minute it was found out that he’d wandered down this far, he’d be yelled at.

One look at this faceless angel in a memory of feeling so elated, having seen them, Crowley knew he wouldn’t mind the scolding. It was worth it. It would be worth it. They could go to the very ends of Heaven, and Crowley wouldn’t care what the consequence would be. He even found himself not _caring_ about where they went, as long as they were together.

The faceless angel showed Crowley everything that they could think to show, from the plans for something called Earth to uniforms that were being made. The uniforms were distinctly small, made to fit the forms they currently had. It felt strange, like Crowley found this form and everything about it, strange. Like he must have not spent much time in this form, save the moments he ran away to spend time with his faceless angel. _His_ faceless angel.

“Is it all paperwork and plans, down here?” Crowley asked.

The faceless angel shook their head. “No. We’ve already started with the creation of the Universe, remember?”

Crowley didn’t, and yet somehow, still found himself nodding with some basic back up of information.

“Once the Universe is made, the Almighty intends to start on Earth. Then, She’ll begin work on the humans.”

“Humans?”

“Well, the humans come last.” The faceless angel looked around, and their face lit up immediately. “Look, there!” they said, grabbing Crowley by the hand.

The faceless angel meant to pull Crowley off to the window to watch as a few angels tried and failed, dramatically, at a prototype for the first _tree_. They hadn’t meant to grab Crowley’s hand, though. Not like that. Maybe his arm, his wrist, anything—anything that would have been less strange feeling, less intimate. They both missed the failure of the prototype tree in turn for staring at one another. The faceless angel hadn’t even the strength to pull their hand back in a jolt of embarrassment. Embarrassment didn’t have a name, yet.

“You…” Crowley’s voice trailed off. Only then did the faceless angel’s hand disappear.

“I’m sorry. That was a bit inappropriate.” It didn’t sound right to hear that in his own voice. Crowley didn’t like it.

“It was nice,” he said, instead. Insistent, even. Crowley reached back out for the faceless angel’s hand and pressed their palms together. “I like it.”

The faceless angel didn’t really seem to know where to look. From their hands to Crowley’s face was all a bit too much of something too intense for them to really place. For any of them to place. But at first glance outside of their own, private universe, the faceless angel had seen all the faces staring at them. Their hands parted immediately.

Maybe this was something they were supposed to be hiding. Maybe the dark-haired angel was right.

But that didn’t mean they couldn’t do it, right? They just had to hide it. They just had to be secret. Crowley was willing to learn how to keep secrets if it meant he got to feel that again, that rushing surge of warmth through his fingertips with the faceless angel’s hand around his.

“Should we go off, then?” Crowley asked. “Is there more to see?”

The faceless angel nodded. “A lot more. Let’s go and see, then, shall we?”

They walked close together, after that. Near enough that their shoulders nearly brushed. Their hands did. Their hands not only touched but were wound so tightly around each other that nothing could have been strong enough to break them apart. And the best thing was that the wave in their robes was enough to hide it. The angels wouldn’t see, and the angels wouldn’t stare. Surely, Crowley would still get in trouble when he returned back to his particular part of Heaven, but as long as his faceless angel would be alright, then fine. It was worth it. _It would always be worth it_.

Crowley hadn’t even realized he fell asleep. The entire gallon container of ice cream was gone, on the floor, and the movie was long finished. But he didn’t notice. He jolted awake in such a panic that the remote flung and so did his blanket. A rushing heart was apparently enough to wake him, these days, and he would worry about the implications of that later. First, there was the _dream_. The dream, of all things. How could he have let himself fall asleep to have something so pleasant rush through his head.

The pleasant part was bad, but there was something worse. The extra details that he’d never remembered. He knew the expressions, the handholding, but just _who_ it was all with. The dream had said it loud and clear—he had been talking to _Archangels_ , the entire time. Archangels. He’d always thought it would have been wonderful if he’d somehow known Aziraphale during his time as an angel, but these new details were all he needed to prove that just a hapless dream.

Crowley had apparently gone no farther than _Archangels_. And if Archangels were what was one floor below him, what did that make _him_? What _was_ he? None of the details seemed to get him any closer to figuring out a thing about himself, just closer to trying to tell him something that he didn’t want to hear. That his faceless angel was an _Archangel_. That severely limited who it could have been, though it didn’t cross out any further possibilities that their faceless angel was a faceless demon, now. Or had died. There had been the first war.

Crowley turned off the television and miracled up his mess. He needed to clean his clothes, too. He still needed to take care of his plants. There was a whole list of things he needed to do, but he’d gone and slept straight until three in the morning. Going back to sleep, at this point, wouldn’t help him. But how he wanted to curl up in his bed and forget that anything had happened. If he did that, he might have another _dream,_ and he was beginning to realize that there were certain things that he really didn’t have any interest in learning.

Some of these details needed to stay locked away in a place he couldn’t reach them. Crowley wouldn’t admit that he was afraid, but he was. He was afraid of what it would mean to know the truth. If he knew everything that he’d gone through as an angel, would he still be _Crowley,_ at that point? It’d taken him long enough to come to terms with being a demon. If knowing anything about his past set him back, then he would rather he didn’t have one.

Curiosity was the issue. Crowley mulled about it while he spritzed water onto his plants. He _wanted_ to know what his dreams had to tell him, especially now that they were turning more into visions. There were details he’d never seen before and things presented, clearer. Everything he’d ever wished he knew was one step away, but now that it was, he was a bit afraid. Learning new things meant that new things happened and that things changed. Hadn’t things changed enough, already?

“And an Archangel, of all the—” Crowley sighed. His plants weren’t certainly going to be scared into submission with all of his mumbling.

He barely even had the strength to continue watering them, much less to _say_ something to them. Or to shout it. Crowley didn’t have the energy to shout. He didn’t have the energy to go to bed. What did that even leave? Nervously pacing around his flat? As if that was going to fix anything. It might not even take his mind off of anything, and he was trying to take his mind off of _everything_. The less he thought about it, the less he had to know about it. And that, currently, was the goal.

Gabriel, on the other hand, had stayed in the park until the last possible moment of light had disappeared. Then, he didn’t have anywhere to go. Gabriel had no human dwelling. That left him with one alternative: to head on back to Heaven. He hadn’t accomplished anything, and maybe he wouldn’t ever accomplish anything. That was a very real fact he might have to face, and it was also one that maybe he wasn’t entirely ready to face. That pesky little spark of hope still left inside of him.

He hadn’t even paid mind to speak to anyone upon his return. He went straight into his private office, which had only come about after there had been whisper that Aziraphale was going rogue. Someone had to monitor him more closely. Gabriel had liked the private office and had still asked someone else to watch Aziraphale. He was too busy watching Crowley to care what Aziraphale was doing, or he had been, until he realized how much of Crowley’s life involved Aziraphale.

None of that mattered. And he had to remember that none of it mattered. Maybe Crowley didn’t remember him for his name and his face, but something in Crowley did _remember_ him. That was the part that he had to focus on. That was the part that had kept Crowley from running off away with Aziraphale, which affectively meant that the last six-thousand years that Gabriel had been letting jealousy eat him alive from the inside out were wasted years. There was time, now. There was a chance to make that up.

He hadn’t quite talked himself off a ledge, but he’d talked himself far enough away from it that the first thing he did, upon sitting down at his desk, he immediately tuned back into his regularly scheduled Crowley watching. One day, he might even feel bad about watching Crowley so often. It was technically stalking, by human standards. Gabriel wasn’t a human, and surely Crowley and Aziraphale should have been aware that their lives were not entirely private.

Did it mean that Gabriel was privy to some rather intimate information about Crowley? Yes, but Gabriel did regret those moments. It wasn’t for any reason of not wanting to know the information, but it was for just how he _knew_ the information. Crowley and his human partners. Gabriel didn’t want to think about it.

He’d tuned in just in time to hear Crowley mutter about an _Archangel_. If Gabriel hadn’t had hope before that moment, he had more than enough hope to last him a lifetime, after it. Crowley maybe didn’t know him, but maybe he knew that he’d been in love with an Archangel. That was progress. That was sad, slow, pathetic progress, but it was progress. Maybe Gabriel just had to fill in the rest of the details. He wasn’t quite in the right frame of mind for a name drop, but _maybe_ he could fill in everything else.

At a more opportune time. He’d already been yelled at. Dropping right in on Crowley wasn’t going to be his brightest plan, especially not in his home. According to humans, homes were very personal and very private. A man’s house was his castle, or something. Gabriel would wait until he could find Crowley out and about, again. That way, Crowley wouldn’t ever know he was being stalked, and Gabriel wouldn’t have to admit to it. There was an ever-growing list of things he didn’t want to admit to, and maybe, just maybe, that was part of the problem.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> disastrous date time

The more pressing problem was that four days had passed, and Crowley had not left the flat. Gabriel hadn’t felt entirely comfortable just throwing himself right into the middle of Crowley’s flat, but that was beginning to be the only option he saw. Still, that didn’t seem like something to do. Crowley had shouted at him for an accidental run-in, in the park. What would he think if he saw Gabriel just standing in the middle of his flat? This was a mission to mend their relationship, not break it worse than it already was.

He knew a bit about what humans did. If he showed up at Crowley’s door and knocked, then Crowley couldn’t be angry. It’d be his own doing to open the door and let Gabriel in. There was always the chance that Crowley would slam the door in his face, too, but at least there was a chance that he wouldn’t. Gabriel worried about the chance that he would. The more times he met with Crowley and failed, the farther their relationship would fall—if they even had one, anymore.

Gabriel didn’t have anything to lose. With one snap of his fingers, Gabriel was standing in the dull hallway that would lead to Crowley’s flat. He was right in front of the door, his finger hovering in front of the doorbell. Apparently, there wouldn’t be any knocking, at all. That didn’t make it any easier to actually hit the button, though. He really should give up this crusade and move on. He was holding onto a fool’s hope.

And still, he pressed the doorbell. Every reason why he shouldn’t have done that passed through his mind while he waited, for exactly nothing to happen. He stood there for an entire minute before his worry was replaced, quickly, by frustration. He had no qualms of hitting the doorbell a second time. A third time, that button was pressed, when Crowley still didn’t answer. Gabriel could _hear_ the bell ring from inside of Crowley’s flat, and he knew Crowley was in there. Either Crowley was ignoring the bell, or he’d gone entirely deaf in the past fifteen minutes.

That frustration, the second it was replaced with anger, was the reason for Gabriel’s second miracle. He was the one who sent out strongly worded letters to angels who used them too frivolously, so he would choose to use them however he wanted. That miracle put him right inside Crowley’s apartment, instead of waiting a single second longer for the chance Crowley would answer him.

Only, being in the middle of Crowley’s study left a strange feeling in Gabriel. He felt like he was trespassing, yes, but he felt _more_ like he was finally getting to experience parts of Crowley he didn’t know. There were astronomy books spread out on his desk, a journal that was left open, and a pen blatantly shaped like a snake. But it was more of Crowley than Gabriel had ever known, and he felt himself feeling a bit strange. He’d been watching Crowley for six-thousand years, and this is what it had led to.

His feelings for Crowley had never changed, even if he was _Crowley_. He’d watched the good Crowley had done. He’d seen the good. Crowley was the worst demon that Hell had ever seen, but he was still _Crowley._ And Gabriel had never felt differently about him. From the temptations to the miracles, Crowley had always had his eye. And his heart, if he were being sentimental. He felt a bit sentimental, running his fingers over one of the astronomy books.

“I’m dreaming,” Crowley’s voice suddenly echoed from the side.

Gabriel jolted and looked to where Crowley was standing, his pajama shirt wide open, in the doorway to his plants.

“I told you to fuck off, and now you’re in my flat. Was it you who’s out there ringing my doorbell at 4 in the morning?” Crowley growled.

Oh. Gabriel hadn’t taken the second to realize what time it was, before he arrived. “I didn’t realize,” he said.

“Of course, not. We can take breaking in and throw it in with the stalking, right? Get out,” Crowley pointed back to the door.

“Listen to me. Just listen to me for a second, Crowley, and I promise, it’ll be worth your time.”

“Worth my time? I don’t want to hear a damn thing out of your mouth.”

Crowley didn’t even wait, at that point. He stomped forward and grabbed at Gabriel, but Gabriel stepped back out of his way just in time to prevent anything. He knew that Crowley would push him right out of the flat, and that wasn’t what he needed. _They_ needed to talk.

“Crowley, stop it! Listen to me—” Gabriel reached out for Crowley, this time. Crowley was too groggy to be himself, and his reflexes were shot with the early hour. When Gabriel reached for him, Crowley couldn’t move away fast enough, and their hands touched.

A jolt ran right through Crowley’s arm, and he wrenched it back as fast as he could, as if he’d touched something that was on fire. The look on his face was one of horror, of terror, but he wasn’t looking at Gabriel. He was looking at his own hand, like he _knew_ something.

“That’s exactly what you did the first time we met,” Gabriel started. “I touched your arm, and you jumped back like I’d just burned you.”

“Shut up,” Crowley grumbled.

“You _always_ act like it hurt, but it couldn’t. I feel the same thing. It’s like fire, isn’t it? Crowley—”

“Don’t touch me!” Crowley shouted, stepping back. “And shut _up_ , I said shut up. I don’t want what you’re selling.”

“Selling, what? Crowley, I’m not selling anything. Listen to me. You walked down the stairs that first time—”

“Shut it!”

“—you met Samael. You met _me_!”

“No!” Crowley shouted. “Can’t you go fuck with someone else!?”

“I’m not _lying_ to you,” Gabriel pressed only closer. “I gave you a tour of Heaven! We held _hands_ , Crowley. You _kissed_ me!”

“I would _never_ ,” Crowley hissed.

Gabriel frowned and tried to ignore how much that hurt. Crowley just didn’t remember properly, that was the issue. If Gabriel could give him enough reminders, the rest of his memory would fill itself in. There had to be a key to it, something that would make it work. Something important.

“You did! You did, right after I _named_ you,” Gabriel retorted. He was going to say it. He didn’t need to see Crowley as a demon or an angel; all he needed to know was that he loved this obnoxious, yelling being in front of him. No matter what, he’d always loved Crowley.

“What do you get out of this!?”

“You came down those stairs, and you didn’t even have a _name_. Samael thought it was fun to give you all sorts of nicknames, but I thought you needed a name. We were—we were _us_ , and you couldn’t just not have a name!”

“I had a name!” Crowley defended.

“Because I gave you one! You’re _name_ , Crowley—”

“Shut _up_!”

“ _Jyzael!_ _”_

It was like the world stopped for a moment as the name echoed through the empty space of the flat. Crowley stared at Gabriel for a long moment, listening to the name. _Feeling_ the name. Jyzael. _It_ _’s just a J, really_.

Only it meant nothing. Crowley frowned and took two very pointed steps towards Gabriel. He was going to ignore that hopeful look in Gabriel’s stupid, pretty, purple eyes, because he didn’t _remember_ any pretty, purple eyes. Gabriel was lying. He was here on some fucked-up mission from Heaven, and Crowley wasn’t going to let him get away with it.

“Get. Out,” Crowley growled. There were scales growing up along his jaw and his cheeks. “If I have to ask again, it’s going to get ugly.”

“Do you really think you can threaten me?” Gabriel argued back. “I’m the _Archangel_ fucking Gabriel—”

“I know who you are. And I know what you’ve done. Now if you—”

“Just give it a _chance!_ _”_ Gabriel shouted. “If you stop fighting it, you’ll remember! Or if you’d just let me _tell_ you—!”

“I don’t know what you fucks up in Heaven are planning, but I don’t want anything to do with it.”

“We aren’t planning anything. This is me! You turned Aziraphale down because of some angel in your dreams, didn’t you? Why are you so against the idea that that angel is _me_?”

“The very thought makes me sick,” Crowley admitted, anger apparent on his face.

“You won’t even give me a chance to prove it to you. Just— _listen_ to me,” Gabriel shouted, and there was a flash of light behind him that had Crowley coming to a standstill, shock in the place of anger. Something familiar?

“Meet with me, tomorrow evening, back at the park where we ran into each other. If you give me _one_ evening, I can prove this to you. But you have to let me.”

Crowley glared.

“Crowley,” Gabriel sighed, “please. If I’m wrong, I’ll leave, forever.”

“I don’t owe you anything,” Crowley snapped. “Get out of my flat—I don’t want to ever see you again.”

That time, Gabriel just closed up his coat, nodded, and left. There was no argument, just a last echoed reminder of meeting in the park. One evening. One _date_. That was all he would ask and nothing more. If it didn’t work, he would go straight back to Heaven and never bother Crowley again. Crowley just wasn’t sure if that one evening, that _one_ date, was going to be worth his time. Was the reward of never having to deal with Gabriel ever again really _worth_ having to spend the evening with him?

Crowley looked at his hand and flexed out his fingers. It had felt like fire. And every detail Gabriel had spewed had matched up perfect with his dreams—and Samael? The name sounded familiar in the way that Crowley had _heard_ about Samael. Samael had been the one to plant the tree of knowledge in Eden, in the first place. God had compensated, poorly, in Crowley’s mind, for his betrayal, but it had taken Her far longer to ever punish him. Last Crowley heard, Samael had been schmoozing it up with Lucifer and the boys. Had he and Crowley really been friends?

It was nearly four-thirty int he morning, now. Crowley was still tired, and really, after spending all that time shouting and screaming, he could use another nap. Or ten. Another thousand years, maybe. If he slept an entire era away, Gabriel would leave him alone, on principle. It wasn’t worth the strife, otherwise. Crowley just buttoned up his pajama shirt and made his way back to bed.

_There was no door, no staircase, and no room of Archangels not to recognize._ Crowley wouldn’t have called where they were a _garden_ , but it felt like one. There were archways and stone paths, a fountain done up in the middle. This was one of those parts of Heaven that had disappeared after the first war, because it was from a better time that they had to forget to move forward with the plan. This Crowley didn’t know that. This Crowley was sitting on a stone bench, his fingers carding through the hair of his faceless angel. His faceless angel was lying with their head in his lap, and it was wonderful.

It was the first time Crowley remembered having wings, and his wings were everywhere. The faceless angel had them too, but Crowley couldn’t quite make them out, like there was a fog between his eyes and the wings of the angel in his lap. That’s where Crowley’s focus was. His faceless angel’s head was in his lap, and Crowley was carding through their hair, his other hand placed on their neck. His hands were warm, each place they touched this faceless angel, and Crowley felt _happy_.

He couldn’t remember ever having felt happy before. Not until he’d met this angel. This angel had changed everything, and once they’d learned what they had, everything had turned from a smoldering spark into a burning fire, between them. Crowley couldn’t imagine a life where he didn’t have this angel so close to him, _with_ him. Oh, he knew exactly how he felt about this angel, and he’d never tire of saying it. He loved them. More than anything. He loved his faceless angel.

“Jyzael?” _Oh no_. The faceless angel was looking at him. “Is something on your mind?”

“You,” Crowley responded.

The faceless angel smiled. “Oh? What a coincidence.”

Crowley laughed. “What were you thinking, then?”

“That I love you,” they whispered. That love was something they had to hide. Crowley had been in trouble more than enough, and his faceless angel was well on their own way to getting in trouble. “What about you?”

“Oh, that you’re _mine_ ,” Crowley whispered, running his fingers down the side of their face. “I don’t have to share you with anyone.”

They laughed in response. “Jyzael,” they muttered.

Crowley leaned over them, his wings spreading out to completely envelope his faceless angel away from sight, to keep them as close as possible. That was the first time Crowley had realized where his wings were and just how many he had. There were wings growing right out of the back of his head, folded over his face. His wings were a beautiful, stark white, and there were six of them, hefty, sprouted out of his back and through his robes. The faceless angel had different wings. Crowley could remember that so many angels had _different_ wings.

The faceless angel laughed again, reaching up to brush the wings out of Crowley’s face and cup his jaw. “Jyzael, I _am_ yours. And you’re mine, aren’t you?”

“Of course,” Crowley promised. “I’d give you my heart, if I could.”

“I think you already have.”

Crowley could feel the press of the faceless angel’s wings against his own, their feathers brushing and weaving together as their lips pressed. Slowly, carefully, like it was the first kiss and the last kiss all at once. They kissed like this, every time, as something to savor and remember. Only this time, it was slightly different. The faceless angel pulled Crowley down a little closer, a little harder. Their tongue pressed over his lips, and Crowley moaned in response. This was new. This was different. And he wanted more of it.

Crowley put his hands around the faceless angel’s jaw and kissed them back, just as fiercely, just as passionately. Their tongues mingled, their teeth clacked, and their wings ran together like they wouldn’t ever be separate, again. The warmth and the fire that spread through them was more than either of them had ever felt, and _more_ just seemed to be the answer. They had no need to breathe, so they could kiss, kiss, and kiss until someone found them, wrapped up in each other’s wings and arms and hands.

But instead, the faceless angel pulled back to smile. Their fingers still ghosted over Crowley’s face, and their eyes were still firmly locked on his. Their beautiful, purple eyes.

“Jyzael, I’ve been thinking about something else. About you and me, about what you and I could do.”

“Just what are you thinking about?”

“Oh, Jyzael, it’s this new thing that the Almighty is creating for the humans, but we can do it too. With enough effort, I mean, we could, well—” the faceless angel trailed off.

“What is it?” Crowley was curious, interested. “You can tell me anything, my light.”

There was a wide smile on their face, in response. “It’s called sex, you see. We can do whatever it is that we please, but I did have something specific in mind. The Almighty describes it as a way to _truly_ become one. The humans will use it for procreation, of course, but we could, well—”

“No,” Crowley said, straightening up. “We can’t.”

Their face fell. “What do you mean, _we can_ _’t_? With the right equipment, we could do anything we chose to.”

“That’s not the issue. I know what it is you’re talking about. I’ve heard the Almighty speak about it. We’ve gotten in trouble just for being together, in the same _room_. What do you think would happen to us if it was found we were doing that?”

“I didn’t think that far ahead. Any punishment would be worth it, Jyzael, please.” The faceless angel reached up to put their hands on Crowley’s face. “I love you.”

“And I love you,” Crowley assured, putting his hand over theirs. “That’s why I can’t lose you. I can’t risk anything.”

That put a smile right back on their face. “You won’t lose me, not if I have anything to say about it.”

Crowley offered his widest smile and his most genuine laugh. Oh, he loved this angel, stupidly. Wholly. Unconditionally. He loved this angel more than he would love himself, more than he would love God. And he would prove that by doing everything in his power to _protect_ this angel. He would do whatever it took to make sure that they stayed safe. Crowley sealed that promise with a kiss, right against his angel’s lips.

Crowley’s wings spread out int he sudden rush of warmth, of _pleasure_. They flapped, entirely on their own, and he could feel the faceless angel’s wings against his. Together. Just adding to that shock of pleasure, of _love_. Pure, unadulterated love. Crowley loved this angel. This angel loved Crowley.

That was when Crowley pulled away from their kiss, to _see_ his angel. And for the first time, Crowley could see their wings. Wide, large, _powerful_ wings with the softest feeling feathers, brushing over Crowley’s, Crowley’s brushing over them. They were the softest, most beautiful color lavender that Crowley had ever seen—

Crowley jolted right out of bed without so much as a thought. He had to go. He had to go—that was _something_. That was something he remembered. A detail. Something he could tell someone about, something he could use to figure this out. And once he figured it out. Once he _knew_ that it wasn’t Gabriel in his dreams, he would be free of this. No date. No Gabriel. No being bogged down by some vague, obnoxious memory. Crowley would be free to _find_ an angel, because he’d know who they were.

The only problem in his plan was that he was going to have to talk to Aziraphale, and he hadn’t seen Aziraphale in six days, now. He would have to apologize before he ever said a thing. He should call, too, but he was in such a rush and such a panic that he was already dressed and grabbing his keys before it’d even crossed his mind to call ahead. His phone was all the way back in his bedroom, and he wasn’t going back that far. He had to go, now. While he could still remember the look of those wings.

Christ, if Crowley couldn’t remember a pair of wings that beautiful. And his own? How had he ever had so many wings? There had been six of them on his back, a pair on his head, and he even remembered there being wings on his _feet_ , of all things. That had implications all its own. Crowley was piecing everything together, but it was something he still wanted a second opinion of. He didn’t want to make assumptions, get his hopes up. No. The most important part was talking to Aziraphale.

Crowley didn’t bother with pedestrians or traffic laws, once he got into the Bentley. It played a depressing selection of Queen for Crowley’s listening pleasure, right up until the point where he reached the bookshop to park. He parked directly on the sidewalk, in his haste to get in, and didn’t care about the looks that he got for it. He went straight for the bookshop, everyone else be damned.

The bookshop was closed, but it was always open for Crowley. Even if the door was locked, it would open for him. He didn’t ever have to _make_ it, either. The door just knew him, as well as his own car did. It opened for him, and in the haste and panic, it couldn’t have opened fast enough. Crowley slammed it behind him, and the racing of his heart died away immediately.

“I’m quite afraid that we’re closed—” Aziraphale stepped out from the side room, and his words died right on his lips. “Crowley.”

Crowley’s panic disappeared. “Oh, Aziraphale, I’m so sorry,” he broke, immediately. He rushed forward and put his hands around Aziraphale’s face. “Angel, I’m so sorry. I should have called. I should have—”

“Crowley,” Aziraphale smiled, folding his grasp around Crowley’s trembling fingers, “it’s alright. I’m glad to see that you’re unharmed. You had me so worried, my dear. Can I make you some tea?”

Crowley nodded. “I’d really like some of your tea, angel.”

Aziraphale sat Crowley down on the sofa and went off to make some tea. He brought back two cups of steaming liquid and set them down on the table. He sat himself beside Crowley on the sofa and gestured him to take the first sip. Crowley, who had never been that much of a tea-drinker before, reached for the cup and drank half of it in one sip. It burned on the way down, but Crowley didn’t care. He just set the teacup down, after his sip, and sighed.

Just like that, he told Aziraphale _everything_. He told Aziraphale every dream he’d ever had and exactly why it’d led him to do what he’d done. How, without these dreams, he knew that he would have accepted Aziraphale’s love and gone off to live happily ever after, but this angel had left him with such a lasting warmth and _love_ that he couldn’t—and then he’d stopped and changed subjects. That wasn’t a nice thing to say, and he’d take it all back if he could.

And then, he skipped right over the part where Gabriel had waltzed right into his life and went straight to the part where he spent all night eating ice cream and watching movies and having more dreams. Which led him to his most recent dream. The one where he’d finally been able to see a feature of this angel.

“I hoped since, well,” Crowley shrugged, “you’ve had a bit more experience with angels, I was hoping you might be able to help.”

“Crowley.”

“Yeah?”

Aziraphale reached out and put his hand over Crowley’s. “You’ve apologized nearly thirty times in the past fifteen minutes, and I need you to know there’s nothing to forgive. You are my best friend, Crowley. I would rather you be happy than anything else. If this is what will make you happy, then I’ll go the ends of the earth to help you.”

Crowley even let himself smile. It’d been nearly a week since he smiled. It felt _good_ to smile. It felt good to be sitting next to Aziraphale, drinking tea. It felt good to know that he still had his best friend, even if he’d done everything wrong, Aziraphale was still here for him. He would always have this, even if he lost everything else.

“I saw their wings,” Crowley said. “I could see it in my dream, we—well, what we were doing doesn’t matter. But I could see their wings.”

“Describe them to me. Most angels just have normal wings, as you know, like mine. But if remembering them was such an important moment, their wings must have been recognizable.”

“Yeah, they were beautiful,” Crowley admitted. “They were big, powerful looking wings. And they were—they were purple. Like, not _purple_ purple, but a softer version of it.”

“Lavender,” Aziraphale helpfully supplied, his eyes wide.

“Yes, exactly!”

That was when Crowley saw the look on Aziraphale’s face. It was a strange mix between shocked and amused. Aziraphale knew exactly who those wings belonged to, and he wore it on his face like a horror story. Crowley gulped and reached out for his tea, again. He took another long sip, never pulling his eyes away from Aziraphale’s. There was just silence between them, for a very long time. It looked like Aziraphale had his own inner battle to work out before he could say anything.

“Do you know anything?” Crowley asked.

“I know who they are,” Aziraphale admitted. “I know exactly who they are. There’s only one angel with those type of wings, as you described: big, powerful, and lavender.”

“R-really?” Crowley stammered. “You just—you just know?”

Aziraphale nodded.

Crowley sucked in a deep breath. Once he knew, that would end an era of his life. He could stop searching for their identity and start searching for them. He could hope that they would remember him. Maybe he’d have the chance to start an entirely new life with this angel, and he wasn’t sure how to feel about that. Change was always frightening, no matter what the cause of it was.

“I’m afraid you won’t like the answer,” Aziraphale muttered, wringing his hands together.

“Tell me,” Crowley begged. “I need to know.”

Aziraphale sucked in a deep breath. He sighed. He breathed again. “Crowley—I can’t do this. I can’t be the one to tell you. _I_ don’t even want to know this.”

“Aziraphale, _please_.”

“It’s Gabriel.”

Crowley blinked. Aziraphale winced.

“Did you hear me?” Aziraphale asked. “It’s Gabriel, Crowley. The angel in your dreams is Gabriel.”

“I heard you,” Crowley sighed, defeated. He didn’t look near as shocked as Aziraphale would have expected him to be.

Crowley had no choice but to rewind his story, after that. He had to tell Aziraphale _everything_ , from the moment he’d run into Gabriel to the park, to every nasty word he’d said, to Gabriel’s promise to disappear if Crowley couldn’t remember him. And Crowley still couldn’t remember. He couldn’t see the face of that angel when he replayed what he knew. A part of him didn’t want to see Gabriel’s face, there, when he remembered everything.

He knew what Gabriel was. He’d _been_ there when Gabriel had been so cruel, when Gabriel believed that Crowley was Aziraphale. The order that Aziraphale would die. The _expectation_ that he would walk right into the fire, on his own. And all of the stories he’d heard from Aziraphale about the things that Gabriel did. How cruel he could be. How could Crowley do that to Aziraphale? Turn him down because apart of him was still in love with the angel who’d been so cruel to him?

There was the part that closed his eyes and replaced the scene on the stone bench, and it was Gabriel’s head in his lap. Gabriel’s smile he was so entranced with. Gabriel’s voice, this time, telling Crowley that they would always be together, telling Crowley that he wanted to have _sex._ Crowley leaned over _Gabriel_ and kissed him. He’d been so happy. He could remember just how happy.

“I think you owe him, don’t you?” Aziraphale said, and Crowley jerked to look at him, in shock.

“What do you mean I _owe_ him?”

“He was right. He thought that you remembered him and came all the way down from Heaven to tell you that and look what you did in response. You yelled at him. The least you could do is meet him for this date. If it doesn’t go well and if you truly don’t remember, properly, then there’s no problem.”

“And what if it doesn’t go poorly and I _do_ remember?”

“Then you’ve reconnected with the love of your life, haven’t you?” Aziraphale smiled, putting his hand over Crowley’s, again.

Crowley didn’t like how that felt. It felt _good_ , but the kind of good where he’d eaten an entire container of ice cream in one sitting and was guilty afterward, because he shouldn’t have. He didn’t deserve to be able to be happy and move on with the love of his life, did he? He was a demon. He was a demon, and he’d hurt the only friend he’d ever had. How did that result in him finding the love of his life and Aziraphale looking like that?

“Why do you look so sad, Crowley?” Aziraphale asked.

“What about you?” Crowley asked.

“Don’t mind me, dear. Trust me when I say that all I want is for you to be happy. I’m not quite as alone as you may think, either.” Aziraphale winked. “You need to see him. If knowing it’s him can’t bring back what you’ve lost, then he’s the only one who can fix it. You need to.”

Crowley nodded. “Alright. I’ll—I’ll meet him.” Crowley jumped up to his feet with a sudden, renewed strength. He hadn’t felt that good in so long. He was _alive_ , with a purpose. He would meet Gabriel, and somehow, that was going to fix everything. First, he had to wait. That was going to be the hardest part. Waiting.

“Hey, Aziraphale?” Crowley sat back down and looked at him. “He said we’d meet tomorrow night, so could I stay here for a bit?”

“As long as you need,” Aziraphale smiled. “Is there more on your mind?”

“I remembered things about myself, too. I had so many wings, Aziraphale. How does an angel have that many wings?”

“And you remember coming _downstairs_ before meeting Gabriel?” Aziraphale hummed, mulling it over.

There wasn’t a question Crowley had that Aziraphale couldn’t answer. Crowley hadn’t just been any angel; he’d been a part of the Seraphim. He hadn’t even _been_ a human-shaped being until that first memory, when he’d walked out of the door. Until then, he was this snake-like creature with legs and fire and wings that Aziraphale managed to describe in great detail. The memories didn’t return, but Crowley felt the familiarity of it. Like he knew exactly what Aziraphale was talking about, and they talked for so long. About everything.  
  


When Crowley left the bookshop the next day, in the afternoon, it was to go directly back to the flat to get ready. He wasn’t sure why he wanted to look his best for this, but he did. He would shower, style his hair, and put on his best outfit. That would take no discernible amount of time, so hopefully, he’d still be able to get to the park on time. If there was extra time, he’d stop by a flower shop and get something nice. Aziraphale had given him that advise. If he wanted anything out of this date, he needed to put into it everything he wanted out of it. And he wanted _everything_.

At the very least, this was his ticket to freedom from it all. For all he knew, he was living on memories and feelings that were so long-since dead that they weren’t worth mulling over a second more. But he had to do this if he were to ever find out how to move forward. Moving forward was all he could think about. If he moved forward alone, then fine. If he moved forward with Gabriel? Well, Aziraphale had been worried. It’s why he’d been so hesitant to admit it. They both knew what Gabriel could do, and there was that innate fear Aziraphale had that Gabriel might, in some way, harm Crowley.

Crowley was a big boy, though, and could take care of himself. He would worry about the harming thing when he got to the date. He was dressed in his finest outfit—an actual pair of trousers, this time, instead of ratty black jeans. Anyone would be lucky to see Crowley like this: his hair finely styled, a lovely maroon shirt, and a very fine sports jacket to go over top of it. Really, he was the epitome of beauty. Anyone would be lucky to have him. Gabriel was going to get to. For an evening, anyway.

All things considered, Crowley hoped it worked out in whatever way the universe thought was the best possible way for it to work out.

Promptly at seven in the evening, Crowley arrived at the park. He hadn’t really a clue what _evening_ meant, and hoped he wasn’t really early or late. There was that worry that he was going to be waiting on that bench forever, given Gabriel’s limited knowledge of how things on Earth actually worked. And that worry disappeared immediately, the second Crowley even saw the bench off in the distance. It was already sporting one finely dressed Gabriel, to the point where even Crowley was feeling a bit under-dressed for the occasion.

Gabriel was wearing some finely tailored suit jacket in his signature purple. There was a white button up shirt beneath it, all topped off with what must have been his favorite scarf. The trousers matched the suit, and his shoes were the finest white Crowley had ever seen. Gabriel was taking this seriously. Gabriel was staking _everything_ on this, and Crowley didn’t really have a reason not to do the same. If everything worked out in the way he was thinking it would, he’d never see Gabriel after this. Might as well have a good night.

“Hey,” Crowley greeted.

Gabriel jolted at the sound of his voice, and it almost hurt to know that Gabriel hadn’t been expecting him to arrive. Crowley should have known better. He was downright cruel. If someone had done that to him, he wouldn’t have expected them to show up for a date, either.

“Crowley,” Gabriel eventually returned the greeting.

Crowley shoved his hands into his pockets. “I’m here now.”

“So, you are.”

“Where are we going? This was your idea, wasn’t it?”

Gabriel ran his fingers through his hair and sighed. “I didn’t think you’d come,” he admitted, pulling himself up to his feet. “I wasn’t sure if it was alright to plan something.”

Crowley sighed. Oh boy. “Well, what did we used to do in Heaven? Apparently, since we did things.”

Gabriel shrugged. “We mostly just talked. We would find some place private to sit and just. Talk. We’d hold hands, go on walks, _kiss_ ,” Gabriel sighed. “It’s not like there was a great deal of stuff to do up there.”

“What did we talk about?”

“We talked about our work. Don’t you remember anything?”

“Nothing. So,” Crowley gestured out to the sidewalk. “Let’s walk and talk, Gabriel. Just like old times.”

Gabriel agreed, and they started to walk. In the first instant of their walk, where Crowley noticed they were a bit closer together than he might have otherwise been comfortable with, Gabriel actually tried to take his hand. Crowley pulled away and stepped away, creating what felt like a canyon between them, though it was only a few extra inches.

“Not that,” Crowley said. And Gabriel retreated.

“We used to talk about our work,” Gabriel continued, instead. “This was back in the beginning, when God was still creating the universe. I shared things with you that I wasn’t supposed to,” he sighed. “I got in trouble for it, too.”

“My heart bleeds for you,” Crowley gawked.

“The Almighty had a soft spot for you—you were one of Her Seraphim, after all. You seemed so interested in the creation of the universe that She even let you help.”

“Yeah, I figured that part out. I made the stars, right?”

Gabriel nodded. “You helped, yes.” He looked like he wanted to say more, but he didn’t.

It was like they weren’t even walking together. That feeling when you and some stranger just happened to be walking in the same direction, where neither felt as though walking away would be appropriate, so they didn’t. They weren’t going to accomplish anything like that, and Crowley eventually sighed. They had to do something, and if it was on his order alone, then they would do it. The faster they both realized that this night was hopeless and fruitless, the faster Gabriel would be out of his life.

The problem was _nothing_ worked. And the more nothing worked, the more desperate Gabriel got. They tried dancing. They tried dinner. They tried a short movie. They tried the gardens. They did everything that Crowley could ever think of when it came to a formal sort of date, all speckled in with whatever story Gabriel could think to tell, and none of it worked. Gabriel even tried to touch him again. And again. No matter how many times Crowley pulled his hand away, Gabriel tried to hold it. To the point where Crowley even felt bad for him. He was clearly hoping for something that wouldn’t happen.

Gabriel told him stories of how he’d helped create the stars. They’d gone over preliminary drawings together in their garden without plants. Gabriel remembered mocking Crowley’s ability to draw, and Crowley had shut him up with a kiss. Of course, that had been Jyzael, and Gabriel was beginning to really believe that Jyzael was lost to him forever. Even after what time it had taken him to realize that there wasn’t a difference between them, Jyzael at least had loved him.

Crowley may have still been Jyzael with an extra edge, but somewhere along the line, he might have lost his love for Gabriel, forever. And Gabriel couldn’t blame him. There was one story that he wouldn’t tell, and it was the one story he hoped Crowley wouldn’t remember. Should this work. This was all contingent on something working. But the dancing, the gardens, the movies, the eating—none of it worked. Gabriel was tired. Crowley was tired. And it was late. They’d started too late to do anything and everything they could.

The closer the clock clicked to the end of the evening, the closer Gabriel was to losing Crowley forever. That promise he’d made. He shouldn’t have made it. This was his last chance, and it was failing. He knew it was failing. He wore it on his face, and their evening was turning sour, quickly.

It was ten when Crowley finally stopped them. Gabriel was sure that just _one more thing_ would be the key, but Crowley even deigned to put a hand on his shoulder to keep him from going. They both knew this wasn’t working. Crowley didn’t remember, and he wouldn’t remember. Gabriel could see every part of Jyzael in him except the parts that mattered—the memories and the love. It was time to give up, then. It was time to say goodbye to Crowley and to the last six-thousand years of his life.

“This isn’t working,” Crowley said what they both knew. “I don’t remember anything, and you know it.”

“Then why did you even come?” Gabriel asked. “If you knew so strongly that you weren’t going to remember, then why come out with me?”

Crowley wanted to say it was because he wanted to get a little payback for the suffering Gabriel had put Aziraphale through. But he had to tell the truth. “I _did_ remember something.”

“What did you remember?” Gabriel almost sounded hopeful.

“Wings,” Crowley said. “I remembered wings. I asked Aziraphale if he recognized them, and he said they belonged to you. So, here I am. I guess I was hoping to prove him wrong.”

“He’s not wrong. I can prove it; we just have to go somewhere private.”

Crowley frowned.

“And there’s something I have to show you. There was a reason you spent so much time talking about your stars, to me. I just can’t describe it well enough with words. I have to show you.” Gabriel held out his hand, then, expecting that Crowley might take it.

“ _Trust_ me,” Gabriel pleaded.

Crowley was sure it would be a mistake, but he put his hand in Gabriel’s and let him whisk them off with a miracle. Part of him just wanted this to end. Part of him wanted to leave Gabriel without looking back. Part of him wanted to remember everything and finally be a peace. These three parts could not agree on a solution, and they would argue until Crowley found which one might work in reality.

When the miracle had done its job, Crowley and Gabriel were standing on a grassy hill somewhere outside the city. Away from the lights and the bustling of progress, it was so easy to see the stars. Gabriel had almost seemed to forget his promise to prove the wing theory in his haste to drag Crowley to the edge of the hill, the highest point. From that point, exactly, Gabriel could point straight above them to a shining, sparkling little star that must have been light years away, and yet it shone brightly through the atmosphere.

“That’s my star,” Gabriel said. “Do you see it?”

“Wait—your star?” Crowley had gone from looking at the star to looking directly at Gabriel. Gabriel was staring straight up into the night sky with such a calm, gentle smile on his face that Crowley didn’t know what to think. He was certainly going to ignore the sudden pang of warmth that shot through him at that face. Somewhere, he knew that face.

“You made me a star,” Gabriel said. “You said that no one in the world would know but me, and that’s exactly how you wanted it. You wanted to make sure that it was just you and me, forever.”

Crowley frowned. “That—what?”

Gabriel looked at him. “Do you not believe me?”

“It sounds so painfully like something I would do that I don’t know what to believe,” he sighed.

Gabriel offered a strained smile. “You _did_ do it.”

Crowley watched, then, as Gabriel reached the end of his road. He turned to face Crowley, solely, and let his wings grow out from his back, stretched out to their full glory. Crowley watched every second of it how they seemed to appear out of magic and a song he couldn’t quite remember. Gabriel’s wings were twice his size and _powerful_ , but more importantly, they were lavender. They were a soft, beautiful shade of purple, and he’d bared them out for Crowley to see. For _only_ Crowley to see.

There was an urge in Crowley’s hands that he couldn’t fight, to put his touch on Gabriel’s jaw to cup his face and tilt his head, just right. Crowley wouldn’t fight it, because it would be their final proof. Gabriel would have one last kiss, and if Crowley remembered nothing, then it might be a fond little souvenir. Crowley couldn’t resist the urge to press their lips together. Gabriel’s wings wrapped around them in an instant, guarding their kiss from the world in a practiced reflex.

Inside the safety of his wings, Crowley couldn’t help but pour himself into this kiss. He’d never get a chance to do this again, so he might as well take everything, _give_ everything. The problem was: everything poured back in the same intensity he gave. Crowley remembered those wings, this face, this angel. _His angel_. His Gabriel. And the last time Crowley had seen those wings, it was when Gabriel—

Crowley pulled away from the kiss, immediately, stumbling back. There was nothing to catch himself on but Gabriel’s wings, and they seemed perfectly strong enough to hold him up without so much as a grimace on Gabriel’s part. No. Gabriel looked worried. He hadn’t looked so worried the last time. How could Crowley ever look at him again?

“Crowley?”

“Get away from me!” Crowley responded. There was panic rising in his chest. He _remembered_. He remembered all of it.

At least, it felt like he did.

“You—you’re the reason that this happened,” Crowley said, but his voice was broken. He had his own hands at the collar of his neck like he was choking. “You _pushed me_.”

Gabriel’s eyes went wide, and there it was. The image. They both remembered. The story Gabriel didn’t want to tell. And Crowley didn’t know the half of it. Crowley would never know the story, because it wouldn’t help. Gabriel had been selfish and awful, and he’d done exactly what Crowley was accusing him of. They’d argued. And Gabriel pushed Crowley right off the clouds, so to say.

“Crowley, please—” Gabriel tried, but Crowley just shook his head.

“Is this what you wanted me to remember? What, that we were in love and then you pushed me right out of Heaven? You’re the reason I’m a demon! You’re the reason that I Fell!”

“I’m sorry, Crowley. You have to listen to me; you have to believe—”

“Believe you? Why should I believe anything you say? You—you’re the one who betrayed _me_ ,” Crowley’s voice cracked. “How could I have been so stupid? I—I _loved_ you.”

Gabriel froze in his place, and his wings disappeared with the shuddering breath. Crowley _loved_ him. Loved. Past tense. As in _did not love, anymore_. The night had failed, and for no reason that Gabriel expected. He’d expected Crowley to not remember him and leave. Crowley did remember him, in the worst way possible, and there was no excuse or explanation to talk away what he’d done. Even if he knew the rest of the story, it didn’t matter. He should have reacted better.

It would have been better to Fall together, than to suffer like this.

Crowley disappeared, after that, and Gabriel had nothing left to hope for. He sat down in the grass, by himself, in his finest suit, without a care in the world for what stains he’d have to work out of it. All he wanted to do was look up at his star and pretend that things had never changed. Crowley wasn’t with him, anymore, and neither was Jyzael.

From the moment Crowley returned to his flat, he shouted out his frustration into the air, at the plants. He kicked and he screamed, and he threw his books to the ground until the pages had all flown out from the first time he’d ripped out all the pages in a fit of _emotion_. It was awful. Horrible. Dreadful. All of it. He’d let himself believe that for one _moment_ he would be able to have something all to himself. He was even willing to let it be Gabriel—oh, he’d wrapped himself up so sweetly in the warmth of those memories. He’d _missed_ it.

He could still feel the burning of Gabriel’s lips against his. Crowley missed all of it. Every second of it. Amid his frustrations and shouting, his wings spread out from his back in such a way that the weight of them drug him down to the floor. Crowley collapsed to his knees and cried out into his hands like it might ease the panic. The anger. The rage. The sadness. The loneliness. The emptiness.

Crowley wrapped himself up in his wings, there on the floor, and didn’t care for what pathetic appearance he had. He would drink himself straight into a stupor before he started _talking_ to his wings, because that would have just been worse and ridiculous. But he would do exactly that, because he knew just how it felt to be without something that had once kept you warm and pleasantly happy. Crowley wouldn’t ever put his arms right around Gabriel again, and in return, he would never have another moment in that garden without pants, with their wings spread out around each other. He’d lost most of his wings, anyway.

He grabbed his finest bottle of wine, or what he assumed was his finest bottle, as he wasn’t exactly looking at it when he grabbed it. It was the first bottle that he’d grabbed, tore open, and immediately set on his way to drinking before he’d even stepped back out into the study. Through the plants, where they were all shivering quite delightfully out his outburst. And then straight into the lounge, where Crowley collapsed on his white sofa with a finished bottle of wine.

That was one of those perks of having a snake jaw, when he wanted one. The bottle down the hatch, the buzz setting in. Crowley would turn on a television show and find himself quite distracted from all this business of the real world for as long as he could manage to stay asleep. That was entirely contingent on falling strictly asleep, and that was where Crowley had his issue.

He did not fall asleep, even with his least favorite reruns on the screen. His eyes were closed, and it was quite like he wasn’t conscious at all, but he was quite and well awake for everything that came next. It was like the puzzle piece had come out of the dryer after it mysteriously fell in, some odd months prior. A puzzle left to sit long abandoned could now be finished, and all the rage about it was a rage well done in waste.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and HERE is the NSFW bit + the ending because im a slut for nice endings

_Crowley stood at the edge_ , because he liked to stand at the edge. It had been the birth of wind, and Crowley liked the way it felt through his wings, through his hair. He was supposed to be meeting Gabriel, and he’d only agreed because there was this new thing growing inside of him. Anger. Rage. He was learning about all of these negative things, but none of them were worse than jealously. Jealously felt like a tight grip in his chest that kept him constricted and still and angry.

Crowley loved Gabriel. And once, he’d been so sure that Gabriel loved him. It wasn’t that Gabriel didn’t love him anymore; that would be foolish. It was that Gabriel just seemed to love _everyone_. He spoke so kindly to everyone. He spoke _to_ everyone. And Crowley didn’t know what to do with these new things that he felt. They were unreasonable and unnecessary, but they were there. All he intended to do was talk to Gabriel about it. He just needed the assurance that that promise spoken to each other held true, even with everyone that played about them, always.

Crowley had all but physically handed his heart over to Gabriel. He wouldn’t ever want it returned, but he did want to know it was safe. The safety was the important part. That he could trust Gabriel wouldn’t shatter it, in his grasp. And there he was, the man of the hour.

Gabriel came walking towards Crowley in his practiced speed. He never rushed anywhere. He never looked like he was overly concerned or panicked. He was always put together, always with his robes in order and his wings beautifully groomed. Of all the angels, Gabriel was the only one who kept himself in such check; Crowley had always liked to attribute that particular fact to himself. He was one of the first angels to ever partake in pride, after all.

“Jyzael,” Gabriel greeted, a smile melting over his face. “You came.”

“Of course, I came.” It felt wrong to welcome Gabriel into his arms, but Crowley opened his arms regardless and kissed Gabriel, briefly. “You called for me, right? How could I deny.”

Gabriel’s smile faltered, but only slightly, that Crowley might not notice. Gabriel had his own reasons for calling this, but they weren’t reasons that he wanted to speak about. He’d been given an ultimatum, of sorts. It was a thinly veiled order, and this would be the way that it played out. Right there; the edge was their set stage, where Crowley and Gabriel stood as two unwilling and unknowing actors. Each with their own private horror.

“Did you need something?” Crowley asked.

“I was hoping we could talk, is all. I haven’t seen you recently.”

“Things been busy, upstairs. Almighty’s a bit tetchy when She doesn’t get her praises, you know.”

Gabriel grimaced, smiled, something. “You’re the only one of Her Seraphim she lets wander so far, so freely. I don’t think it’ll last forever, Jyzael. I’m afraid.”

Crowley shook his head. “No reason to be afraid. Even if you never saw me again, I’m sure you’d be alright.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“I mean it, perfectly. You have so many friends, I mean. So many partners to help with the work. Building a universe is some amount of work, isn’t it?”

Gabriel took a step back, out of Crowley’s arm, so that they fell back down to his sides. “You’re being a bit cryptic, don’t you think?”

Crowley grimaced. “I mean, the way you talk with the other Archangels. Even other _angels_. They’re lower than you, aren’t they? So, why give them so much leeway? You talk to them like they’re your friends, like you _care_ about them.”

“I love all of God’s creatures, just as She would have it.”

Crowley snorted. “Right. Is that all, then? Is that the love I have, too? Just the love you give everyone?”

“You know that’s not true. Jyzael, listen to me—”

“I have listened to you. You’ve told me you love me, but I see how you _love_ everyone else. How can I feel safe in knowing that? You just love me like one of God’s creatures.”

“I said that’s not true. Why are you so intent on believing that you’re no more special than anyone else?”

“How could I not?”

“Jyzael, do you even know what you sound like?”

“Does someone know what you sound like?” Crowley asked, and it was his final act, his final scene, his final line. “Is this what it is? I wouldn’t give into your scheme, so you went somewhere else?”

There was silence.

“Take that back,” Gabriel muttered.

“Strike a nerve, did I?”

“I said _take it back_ ,” Gabriel spat, that time. “I won’t have you spreading lies about me because you’re—because you’re _jealous_.”

“Oh, that’s rich!” Crowley laughed. “Me? Jealous? You’re fooling yourself if you think I even care.”

Everything changed, after that. It was irreversible and cruel. It was what pushed Gabriel to make those few steps forward, and what had Crowley realizing what he’d just said. What he’d just done. Effectively, he’d carried out his greatest promise: he would protect Gabriel from the wrath of their God and ensure that he would never Fall. Effectively, he’d signed off on his own damnation.

“Gabriel?” Crowley tried. “Gabriel—?”

Stage set. Scene: end. Curtains closed. Crowley didn’t fall, he was pushed, right off the edge. He shouted as he fell backwards, and he _it was a sight he vowed never to forget. Gabriel had pushed him_.

This time, Crowley didn’t jolt awake. He rather just opened his eyes to the same world that he’d left, but it felt as though it had all shifted to the side. To the left, to the right, it didn’t seem to matter. Just that, all of the sudden, Crowley was sober as he was awake: wide and perfectly so. Everything was still and quiet, so quiet that Crowley might have heard a pin drop or the squeak of a tile as someone walked. And that was the strangest thing. Crowley wasn’t even shocked. Those must have been fine shoes against his floors.

He pushed himself off the sofa and ran his fingers through his hair, just to ensure he didn’t look as awful as he felt, then left for the hallway. He hadn’t need to go farther than the plant room, where he could see through to his study in a sudden rush of deja-vu. Gabriel was standing there, stacking ripped out pages on Crowley’s desk. For a moment, it all looked fake, but Crowley walked through to the study, anyway.

“You came,” Crowley said.

“Of course, I came. You called me,” Gabriel set down another page then stopped to look directly at Crowley. “I heard you shouting.”

“I remembered the rest of it.”

Gabriel hummed in response, folding his hands behind his back.

“I’ve done a lot of shouting, haven’t I?”

“A lot of accusing, but you weren’t the only one at fault.”

“I’m sorry,” Crowley said, stepping closer. “For then. For tonight. For all of it.”

Gabriel sucked in a deep breath and sighed. “I have something to tell you, too. The reason that I wanted to talk to you, that day.”

There had been one very intense conversation with the Almighty that had led him straight to the edge, that day. God knew about what they’d been doing, from the moment Crowley had first escaped the throne room to the very first kiss, when Gabriel had given Crowley a _name_. God had recounted the day in such vivid detail that it was as if she’d been watching.

Gabriel had decided that, if they were going to be together, then he couldn’t go another moment without having a way to refer to Crowley. He’d picked a name out of nothing, just something that sounded good. Jyzael sounded beautiful, he thought. Jyzael and Gabriel—the Lord could even recount the very thought process Gabriel had taken to reach his decision. Then, Gabriel had delivered his news. Crowley, overwhelmed with the feeling of it, of identity, of love, had surged forward with his hands around Gabriel’s face and kissed him so passionately that the world had stopped.

It hadn’t taken them more than a minute to realized they enjoyed the kiss, that they wanted to have an infinite number of kisses. They would have them, too. And the Almighty would know about every kiss, every touch, and every ignored warning. She could count how many times they’d been told to stop, and how many times they hadn’t stopped. She would not suffer their behavior any longer, and She would only save one of them. Or neither of them. The choice had been Gabriel’s.

Gabriel could either join Crowley in his Fall, which would have happened there regardless, or he could be the one to push him over the edge. If Gabriel chose the latter, he would retain his place as an Archangel for all time, and the Lord would not see to punish him again for his great sacrifice. She knew, firsthand, what it was like to make a sacrifice. She said She carried the weight of sacrifices not yet made, and they had been the very things Crowley questioned Her on at every turn.

Crowley had too much freedom, and he would find no place in Heaven with it. Crowley was destined to Fall. And Gabriel was given the choice to make on if he would Fall alone or fall in love.

“The rest, I’m sure you remember.” Gabriel hadn’t so much as looked up from the ground as he told his story.

Crowley stepped forward, reaching out to curl Gabriel’s hand into his own, where his free hand slipped along Gabriel’s jaw to tilt his head towards Crowley. Gabriel looked at him, his blinking purple eyes, but he did not smile.

“You would have Fallen,” Crowley whispered in a voice that Gabriel had not heard in years. “I know you, Gabriel. You came to Fall, didn’t you?”

Gabriel couldn’t give an answer.

“Then, I was the one who chose, wasn’t I? I let my jealousy get the best of me…” he trailed off, running his thumb over Gabriel’s cheek. “Just like you have.”

Crowley couldn’t imagine what Gabriel had been living with, and he’d lived with it for six-thousand years. Crowley had only lived for it for what would have accounted to a few human moments. It must have been eating Gabriel alive, to watch the way Crowley and Aziraphale frolicked about. It must have been slowly killing him. For six-thousand years.

Gabriel fell right against Crowley’s chest in the tightest, easiest hug Crowley had ever pulled him into. Their chins rested on the other’s shoulder, their arms wrapped tightly around one another. Crowley’s wings had since disappeared, but Gabriel’s hands knew them, well enough. His fingers traced over Crowley’s back, where his wings would grow. Where the scars were from the ones he’d lost.

“Gabriel,” Crowley whispered, right into his ear, “I’m so sorry. For all of it. For everything.”

Gabriel pressed his face into Crowley’s neck and seemed to only hold him tighter.

“If there’s ever anything I can do to make it up to you—”

“Crowley,” Gabriel whispered, harshly, holding tighter. His voice was muffled by Crowley’s neck. “I’m sorry, too.”

Crowley could have cried. He could have. He shifted their hold so he could have his hand in Gabriel’s hair, to hold him as close as possible. The weight that disappeared from the both of them was unfounded, but it was gone. Everything felt light, again, like the very first time they’d ever laid eyes on each other and Gabriel’s touch had burned. Now, there wasn’t so much as a single twinge of pain. Just the most beautiful warmth blooming forward between them.

When Gabriel pulled back, it was only for Crowley to put his hands around his face and look at him again, closer. Crowley pressed their foreheads together and smiled. Gabriel’s hands were gripped around his waist in such a way that Crowley knew Gabriel was afraid, but so was he. Gabriel could no doubt feel the tremble in Crowley’s hands, against his face. There was so much they could get wrong, now, but there was so much that they could get right. And Crowley had a slight idea of where to start.

“I need you to know something,” Crowley whispered to the space between them. “Before we do anything stupid, I need you to know this.”

“Tell me. I’m listening.”

“I’m going to make a lot of mistakes. We’re going to fight. We’re going to stumble over this like two idiots who don’t know how to dance, anymore. It’s going to be hard.”

“Crowley,” Gabriel admonished, but he was smiling. Crowley could see the slightest pinpricks of that smile.

“But there’s no one that I’d rather do it with than you. You’ve always been my everything, even when I couldn’t remember your face.”

“I missed you,” Gabriel said, his own tentative touch to Crowley’s jaw. “I missed the things you told me.”

“I have one important thing to tell you. Will you listen to me?”

“I’m better at listening than you are, trouble.”

Crowley’s heart could have fluttered right out of his chest. “Gabriel, I love you.”

“You have no idea how long I’ve waited to hear you say that,” Gabriel said, in a rush. He surged forward to smash his lips to Crowley’s.

Crowley dropped his arms to wrap them tightly around Gabriel’s waist, pulling him as close as he could be. Gabriel kept his hands on Crowley’s face, feeling over his skin as they kissed. And they kissed. And they _kissed_. There was a fire in it as they kept going, pushing into each other with strength and with a forgotten feeling. Their head moving, always together in a practiced dance they didn’t know they knew. Then, something entirely new.

Gabriel gasped when there was tongue pressed against his lips, but he did not falter nor pull away. He parted his lips for Crowley, and Crowley’s serpentine tongue slipped right inside to rub over his own, to ghost over his teeth and the ridges of his mouth. Gabriel had never felt anything like it, and it stirred something within him. He could already feel how it affected Crowley, how his hips were moving and there was a hardness against Gabriel’s own. It was a reminder that Crowley _could_ react that way, because he’d done this before.

Gasping, Gabriel pulled back from their kiss with his hands on Crowley’s chest to keep him back. “Crowley, Crowley, wait—”

“What is it?” Crowley asked.

“I’ve never had sex,” Gabriel said. “That’s what happens next, isn’t it?”

“It doesn’t have to.” Crowley shook his head. “We can do whatever you’d like. I’ve got good wine, movies, a stereo. I could teach you to dance—”

Gabriel put his fingers over Crowley’s mouth to shush him, and there was a look in Crowley’s eyes like he wanted to do more than stand there, still.

“I haven’t even made the effort,” Gabriel admitted. “What if that’s what I wanted to happen next? What would I do? What would you want me to do?”

Crowley folded his fingers over Gabriel’s and pulled them away from his lips. “It doesn’t matter what I want,” he said. “It matters what you want. You were the one who suggested this so many years ago, if I remember. You must have had an idea, didn’t you?”

“That’s why I have to ask.” Gabriel smoothed his hands over Crowley’s lapels, grasping them. “I thought about it then, and I’m thinking about it now. I know exactly what I want, but that’s why it matters what _you_ want. I remember being the first one to tell you how it was done.”

“And yet, you’re the one without something between your legs, eh?” Crowley laughed. “I want whatever you want, I promise.”

“Help me,” Gabriel gasped, their lips only inches apart now. “I’ve been thinking about the way you would take me for my entire life, Crowley.”

“Me?” Crowley asked, smoothing his fingers back through Gabriel’s hair. “It’s me, isn’t it? _Crowley_ , I mean. Not Jyzael, you’re after?”

_“Crowley.”_

Crowley didn’t waste another second. He took Gabriel by the arm and dragged him through the plant room, down the hall, and into his bedroom. The door was closed, locked, and forgotten about. There were more important things at stake, like getting each other out of their clothes. Gabriel had absolutely no shame, and when Crowley’s hands were on him, on his coat and his scarf and his buttons, Gabriel didn’t stop him. Gabriel pushed back, wrestling Crowley out of his sports jacket and working that silly little tie from around his neck.

Crowley pulled back to work his shirt off, first, but then he was all but ripping Gabriel’s open to smooth his hands up Gabriel’s body, to feel his chest. While Crowley touched, Gabriel slipped his shirt off his shoulders down to the ever-growing pile of clothes on the floor. Crowley’s hands roamed over Gabriel’s newly exposed skin, right down to the line of his hips peeking out from the waistband of his trousers. After Gabriel’s hurried nod, Crowley worked to undo his belt, his button, and his zipper. There was nothing beneath his trousers, just a smooth expanse of skin, but Crowley didn’t even care.

Crowley wrestled out of his own trousers as fast as he could manage, so that he could have his hands back on Gabriel. They met in another heated kiss, arms around each other, hands roaming spaces they had never seen. Gabriel shivered under the touch, all of it so _new_. Maybe he should have been nervous, but he’d been dreaming about this since before he’d even asked Jyzael, thousands of years ago. When Crowley pulled him off towards the bed, Gabriel didn’t hesitate to follow.

With Gabriel flat on his back, against the mattress, Crowley found himself a comfortable place to kneel between Gabriel’s thighs, spread out around him. He didn’t waste a single moment, running his hands over Gabriel, feeling the tremble of his skin as Crowley’s touch neared his groin. There was nothing there, just a smooth mound of skin for Crowley to mold his hand over and _feel_. It made Gabriel jolt, all the same, like a touch he’d never felt.

“Have you _never_ made an effort?” Crowley asked.

Gabriel shook his head. “I didn’t have a reason to.”

Crowley hummed to himself and leaned down to press his lips into it, Gabriel’s mound. “What do you want down here? We can make you anything: a nice prick, a cunt, anything.”

Crowley didn’t offer Gabriel so much as a moment to think before he was mouthing over the smooth skin. Gabriel’s hips seemed to work on their own, rolling into Crowley’s mouth. Crowley’s tongue was along him in seconds, tracing out mindless patterns. Even without anything between his legs, Gabriel couldn’t deny that the skin was sensitive, that he was already feeling more pleasure than he’d ever known.

“I do have a male corporation,” Gabriel started talking, but it was so hard to concentrate on the words with Crowley’s tongue slithering over the crease of his thigh and his hip. “I—I’ve always thought of having a penis.”

Crowley snorted. “Nobody calls it that. Stupid words, you ask me. Don’t worry,” he pulled away from Gabriel, resuming the gentle touch of his hand. “We’ll make you a nice cock.”

“We?” Gabriel asked, shifting himself up onto his elbows.

“Sure. Just trust me. I know what I’m doing.”

“If you say so.”

Gabriel settled back down into the pillows and watched as Crowley flattened both of his hands over Gabriel’s mound. The sensation that ran through him, then, was overtly strange. It was like Crowley had taken a hold on his body and started to mold it, tug on it, and shape it into just what he intended. He started with the shaft, and if Gabriel had known any better, he might have likened it to watching pottery, of all things. This was much more intimate than just appearing one, which Gabriel was more than capable of doing.

But Crowley wanted to do this, so he did. Once he’d crafted Gabriel a thick cock, befitting someone of his stature, he shifted just below to form a matching pair of heavy bollocks. And still, even further down he went. Back, until he had Gabriel’s knees up and a better view of his arse. Gabriel felt something open right between his cheeks, and he gasped at how strange it felt. He didn’t ask questions. Crowley had done this before and had asked that Gabriel trust him. Gabriel would trust he knew what he was doing.

“And there you go,” Crowley said. “You’ll have to tell me what you think later. I want to know I did a good job.”

Crowley shifted closer, until their hips were pressed together, and he could bend over Gabriel to kiss him, again. Gabriel could _feel_ the hardness of Crowley’s cock against his own, which felt much different. It was still soft, limp against his hip. Something started to stir when Crowley began to rock his hips forward.

“Thinking about how I’d take you, hm?” Crowley hummed, hovering only inches above Gabriel’s face. “That’s what the back piece is for. So, I _can_ take you.”

“You want to,” a gasped statement.

“Of course, I do. I’m a bit flattered that you haven’t done this yet. Feel a bit bad that I have.”

Gabriel put his hands around Crowley’s face and just shook his head. “That doesn’t matter right now. What matters is that you’ll never do this with anyone else again.”

“Yes, sir,” Crowley laughed. He pressed another hot, saliva dripping kiss into Gabriel’s lips before he really got started.

It was going to be as much of an adventure for Crowley as it would be for Gabriel. Gabriel had never been touched, not like this. Every inch of skin was someplace new, something different, and Crowley intended to map it all out. He wanted to know where Gabriel liked to be touched; Crowley wanted to _teach_ Gabriel where he liked to be touch, on the off chance that maybe there’d come a time where even the great Archangel Gabriel would stoop to touching himself. That would be a sight, one Crowley wanted to see.

Crowley trailed his kisses down Gabriel’s jaw, over the tight lines of his neck where he found all the right places to clamp down and suck. Gabriel didn’t seem to make much noise, but the way he would jolt underneath Crowley told him all that he needed to know. Crowley would cover him in little purple marks if it meant feeling Gabriel jerk like that, his hips rutting up of their own accord. There was a part of Gabriel, somewhere, that knew exactly what was going on. He was just unsure.

Crowley would fix that.

“You can touch me, too,” Crowley said, replacing his mouth with his hands just to roam them over Gabriel’s chest.

“Oh, right. I was wondering what I should do with my hands.”

Crowley snorted and grabbed Gabriel’s wrist, tugging at him until he could place Gabriel’s hands on his chest. “Explore,” Crowley told him.

Gabriel did just that, and as Crowley returned to mouthing over his chest, Gabriel just touched. He had his hands over Crowley’s shoulders, his back, his neck. Anywhere that he could reach, he did anything he thought to do. That included scraping the blunt of his nails down Crowley’s chest, and that had Crowley shivering. Crowley had to stop his own ministrations to collect himself. He returned with a vengeance, right after, leaning down to put his mouth over Gabriel’s left nipple.

Gabriel’s hips rolled up and he gripped into Crowley’s hair, but it wasn’t quite the reaction Crowley was looking for. He could still pepper his purple little marks over Gabriel’s chest and leave his nipples raw and red, but Crowley wanted more out of Gabriel. He wanted to find what would make him moan, out loud. What might leave him shivering and begging for more underneath Crowley’s touches.

Crowley trailed farther down Gabriel’s body until Gabriel was left with nothing to do but grip his hands into the sheets. He was already half hard, and Crowley’s breath so close only seemed to make it worse. Crowley was eying Gabriel with such a predatory glare that it was hard to tell what he was going to do, but Gabriel wasn’t the least bit disappointed. Crowley lavished his tongue over Gabriel’s hips, holding him steady with nails digging into the skin of his thighs. Crowley moved his mouth, his tongue.

Gabriel’s cock hadn’t been so much as touched and already, it was stiff and aching. With Crowley’s hold, Gabriel couldn’t buck his hips like he wanted to, and Crowley was doing everything in his power to _ignore_ the thick length only inches from his head. He was far more concerned with sucking marks into Gabriel’s hips, and the pleasure of it was something Gabriel had never imagined. It was such a normal spot, too; he would have never thought that there were just places on the body that reacted like this.

It was all he could do to bit down on the back of his knuckles to keep himself quiet. Without the ability to move, he had to do _something_ , and that included moaning. They were sounds he didn’t even know he could make, and there was an unfamiliar rush of shame when he heard them. He tried to silence them, but it wasn’t enough. His moans were muffled, but not stopped. Crowley had stopped, though, pulling back that he could take Gabriel’s hand away from his mouth.

“There’s no one to hide from, down here,” Crowley said. “You can make as much noise as you like.”

“It sounds strange.” Gabriel didn’t even recognize the sound of his voice.

“It sounds _beautiful_ ,” Crowley told him. “I want to hear more of it. I want to be the only one in the world who gets to hear it.”

To prove his point, Crowley wrapped a hand around Gabriel’s cock and started a slow pace over his length. Gabriel _did_ moan and would have immediately covered his mouth of Crowley hadn’t caught his hand and pressed it back down into the mattress. Gabriel still had another hand, but that one, he wrenched into the sheets to ground himself as Crowley stroked him. Crowley knew exactly what he was doing and exactly where to touch, when to squeeze ever so slightly. He brushed his thumb over the tip of Gabriel’s cock, right over the slit, and that had Gabriel’s back arching up, his hips jerking.

Crowley shifted, once he was sure Gabriel wouldn’t cover his mouth again and used his free hand to roam over Gabriel’s hips. That got the most pleasant reaction yet, and Gabriel truly started to tremble. Crowley’s ghost touches had his entire body alight with a pleasure he’d never known before, and he couldn’t seem to get enough. His hips bucked up, jolted under Crowley’s touch, and his cock was starting to leak.

“Crowley—” Gabriel groaned. “What about you? Can I do anything?”

Crowley hushed him. “Plenty of time for that, I promise. I’ll see your hand around my cock soon enough. My _cocks_ , even,” he smirked up at Gabriel.

Gabriel seemed to shudder in response, watching idly, then, as Crowley shifted them together. He had a hand around his own cock, stroking himself in tandem with Gabriel, moving his hips in much the same way. When Crowley pushed their cocks together, Gabriel nearly shouted as a new wave of pleasure rushed over him. It was all so warm, so intense, wrapped up in a tight coil in his pelvis—and he didn’t know what it meant.

“Like you once told me, Romeo, we can do _anything_. And I am a snake. Did you even know snakes had two cocks?” Crowley leaned over just a little, working his hips into Gabriel’s. He had a hand wrapped around the both of their cocks, keeping them together as they rutted into each other.

“R-Romeo?” Gabriel gasped.

“Seems fitting hm?” Crowley even had to stop to grunt, then, and Gabriel couldn’t help but feel a bit proud. He wanted to watch Crowley lose himself as much as Crowley wanted Gabriel to lose himself. “You came running after me, thinking I’m dead? Some part of me, anyway. We skipped the bit about the suicide, though—” Crowley gasped when Gabriel bucked his hips just right, the head of his cock catching the ridge right under Crowley’s.

“Shut up,” Gabriel said. He didn’t think that was a very fitting topic.

But Crowley just laughed. “Yes, sir,” he said.

Crowley worked their hips together, stroking their cocks, until Gabriel was positively trembling underneath him. His knuckles were white with the force he used to grab the sheets. Gabriel wasn’t even breathing, and his eyes were screwed shut, his mouth dropped open in a silent moan as Crowley worked. If they’d been anything but a demon and an Archangel, Crowley would have reminded him to _breathe_ , but he couldn’t deny how hot it was, seeing Gabriel so strung out, like that. He wanted to see this through, until the end.

He could tell Gabriel was close, and he could tell Gabriel didn’t know what it really meant to _be_ close. Everything about him was so tight and stiff that Crowley couldn’t help but feel like he wanted to tear it all down. He wanted Gabriel to relax, even if that meant taking him apart and putting him back together again. Crowley would do it gladly, slowly, and with as much pleasure as he could possibly give.

Crowley flicked his wrist, slowed his hips, and really focused over the head of Gabriel’s cock. That was where he seemed the most sensitive, and Crowley’s thumb over his slit dragged moans out of Gabriel that he wouldn’t have ever dared release, otherwise. Crowley thought he might come from that sound alone, Gabriel’s desperate little moans.

“Come on, Gabriel,” Crowley whispered to him. “Just let go. I know you can do it.”

“D-do _what_?” Gabriel gasped, his hips jolting again.

“Come for me.” Crowley intended to give Gabriel his first orgasm, ever. “Just let go. I’ll explain everything you need, later, all textbook-like for you.”

Gabriel groaned and worked his hips up into Crowley’s, all the same. He was chasing something, and he didn’t even know what that something was. He knew it felt good, that it was warm, hot, and more intense than anything he’d ever known. With Crowley above him, looking at him with those wide, golden eyes, whispering little things to him—it came quickly. Gabriel shouted as he came, spend shooting up the length of his stomach in thick, heavy strands of white. The rush of pleasure that went over him was more than anything he’d ever known, more than he could handle, and it just kept _coming_.

Crowley hadn’t even stopped stroking them, and that just seemed to make it last longer. Crowley milked every last second of Gabriel’s orgasm right out of him, continuing to work their cocks together like he did. In the last moment of it, that same wave of pleasure ran over Crowley like a tidal wave. He came over Gabriel’s hips and his stomach, moaning through it. His face scrunched up, and Gabriel was helpless but to watch the way his hips sputtered, how his cock twitched.

And when it was done, Crowley was just there, staring at Gabriel and the mess they’d both made, the mess on his hand. Crowley was quite shocked, and he wore it on his face blatantly. What felt like an hour passed between them in only thirty-seconds as Crowley collected himself.

“Wasn’t expecting that,” he said.

“What?” Gabriel asked, pushing up onto his elbows again. He, too, could see the mess on his stomach. His initial reaction was to grimace, but he tried hard to not look grossed-out by it.

“I, uh. Don’t usually come that fast,” Crowley admitted. “That’s what that was, by the way. It’s called an orgasm. Feels good, yeah?”

“Fast?” Gabriel asked.

“Yeah. I can usually last a bit longer, but hey. Must be because it’s with you,” he teased, grinning. He’d expected some immediate retort, but Gabriel just laid back and cupped his hands around his mouth to breathe.

“Is that it, then?” Gabriel asked, and he almost sounded disappointed. He’d seen so much of what Crowley had done, and it’d always been _more_ with his other partners. Maybe he could take some pride in knowing that Crowley couldn’t keep himself together with him, but he’d been expecting, well, more.

“Oh, Gabriel,” Crowley laughed. He worked a quick miracle for a hand towel, which he used to clean them both up before he tossed it to the side and ran his hands up Gabriel’s chest. “That’s only the end if you want it to be.”

“I don’t want it to be,” Gabriel said, quickly. “I want to have sex, Crowley.”

“We _are_ having sex,” Crowley laughed. “You should learn to be more specific.”

Gabriel frowned and dropped his hands away from his mouth. “Penetrative sex.”

“I’m listening.” Crowley folded his arms and leaned over Gabriel, resting on his chest so closely that their noses nearly touched.

“I want you to penetrate me. Why are you being so difficult?”

Crowley dropped his forehead into Gabriel’s neck and tried to contain his laughter. “Fuck, Romeo, we need to work on that dirty talk. We’ll get there, we’ll get there.”

Gabriel’s nose scrunched up in confusion, but Crowley didn’t mention it again. Instead, he produced a little bottle, of what he called _lubricant_ , out of the top drawer of his nightstand. Then, he made a gesture which Gabriel clearly understood as an order to roll over, but he did not. He did not want to do that. He could play it off as more confusion, but that only seemed to make Crowley frown. Crowley took a minute to busy himself with the lube, working it over his fingers before he tried again.

“It means _roll over_ , Gabriel. Let’s see it happen.”

“I don’t want to,” Gabriel said. “I want to see you.”

Oh. Okay. Crowley sucked in a deep breath and nodded. “You will, I promise. We can’t just get into it, you know? That would hurt you. I have to work you open, but I’ll fuck you all sweet, missionary style, trust me.”

“I don’t know what any of that means,” Gabriel frowned.

“ _Trust me_.”

“I don’t like that word either,” Gabriel continued, but he did roll over onto his front, his arms folded under the pillows. Crowley took one of those pillows to shove under his hips. “ _Fuck_ ,” he replied.

“What would you prefer?” Crowley asked, making sure that Gabriel was as comfortable as he could be. Gabriel surely wasn’t comfortable with his arse in the air, but he trusted Crowley.

“What are the alternatives?”

“Oh, I know one you’d like.” Crowley grinned to himself, running his hand over Gabriel’s arse. He took a nice, generous handful to pull Gabriel open. “I’ll make love to you,” Crowley whispered.

Gabriel actually shuddered in response, shifting his hips back so Crowley could have a better view of him. Gabriel’s cock had gone soft, but they’d fix that quickly. Crowley was more concerned with the logistics of it all than the actual fun part, but he’d get there.

First, he just ran his hand over Gabriel’s arse. He had a better arse than half the humans Crowley had ever seen. Nice firm, bouncing globes for Crowley to grab. Oh, he might even like to give Gabriel a hard spanking, just to see how he reacted, but it was far too early for that. Gabriel didn’t even seem to know what half of it meant, so Crowley was sure he’d taking spanking badly. There was time, though. There was time for all of it, anything they could think of. Now, that Crowley had Gabriel back, he wasn’t ever going to let him go, again.

When Crowley ran his fingers through Gabriel’s cleft, Gabriel let out a sudden gasp at the touch. _Cold_. One incredibly obnoxious and frivolous miracle later, the lubricant was warm to the touch, and Gabriel settled back against the pillows. He was going to lose himself in this, whether he wanted to or not. Crowley was going to make sure of it.

With his thumb, he pulled at Gabriel’s puckered little rim. Gabriel shivered in response, but he _moaned_ , oh so prettily, when Crowley worked his first finger in. Crowley took it slow, working his finger in one knuckle at a time, then back, then forward. A slow, easy pace, trying to get Gabriel used to the feeling. He was squirming, jolting, but he hadn’t voiced any discomfort. Crowley kept going. He added more lubricant where he felt necessary, and maybe too much, but something about watching the lube slide down Gabriel’s taint had Crowley’s cock twitching with interest.

Just another thing to add to the list. Could he get Gabriel to work his own little miracle? He’d love to see what Gabriel looked like, all wet with his own slick. But later, later.

Crowley worked in a second finger, and Gabriel shifted again. He wasn’t making much noise, but his hips were rolling back onto Crowley’s fingers, and his cock was already making a valiant effort back to full hardness. Crowley was impressed. Crowley was in awe. He ran his hand over the swell of Gabriel’s arse and scissored his fingers, stretching Gabriel wider open—and it was the first real gasp Gabriel had made.

“You alright down there?” Crowley asked. He shifted his free hand to rub over Gabriel’s cock, instead, where it was wedged up against the pillow beneath him. “Tell me if it hurts, okay?”

Gabriel nodded. “It’s just strange,” he said. “I’ve never—”

“I know, I know,” Crowley hushed. He worked his thumb and forefinger around Gabriel’s cock, just enough stimulation to get him focused somewhere else. “I’ll take care of you.”

“I-I know. I—that feels good,” Gabriel breathed, his body grasped by trembling.

Crowley smiled and continued his work. He would have Gabriel falling apart on his fingers, if he could wait that long. Crowley was trying not to rush, but the way Gabriel jerked each time Crowley’s fingers pressed into him, again, and stretched apart, was so incredibly enticing that Crowley wasn’t sure how he’d lasted this long.

And then, Gabriel was jolting up onto his elbows, his muscles seizing, his walls clamping down on Crowley’s fingers, and moaning out something long and pretty. Crowley just smiled and kept going, working his two fingers over that little spot until Gabriel was shivering, relaxing again. Until Gabriel could barely contain himself from the pleasure of it, and then Crowley slipped his fingers back to work in a third one, alongside the first two.

“What was that?” Gabriel asked.

“Prostate. Angels don’t have them, of course, but feels good, hm? Thought you’d like it.”

Gabriel nodded, his breath coming out in shuddering gasps. He settled back into the pillows and hugged on into his chest, something to hold onto while Crowley continued to work him open. There were three fingers pressed inside of him now, dragging over his walls, spreading the slick of the lubricant deeper and deeper. Gabriel could feel how the excess dripped down his perineum and over his cock, where Crowley was still stroking him.

Gabriel lost of himself on the feeling of Crowley’s fingers. Instead of focusing on how long this would take, he focused on how _good_ it felt, to have Crowley inside of him. Any part of him would do, apparently. Just the feeling of his fingers had Gabriel on edge, again, but it was more than that. It was how none of it hurt, how careful Crowley was being. Gabriel had seen Crowley’s nails before this, and yet, not a prick of them. Crowley was doing everything that he could think of to make this pleasurable, and Gabriel would get drunk on that feeling.

Crowley worked until he could spread his three fingers out wide. Gabriel opened up so prettily for him, it was almost unbelievable, but Gabriel had wanted this for longer than it’d ever been on Crowley’s mind. It only made sense. And Crowley wouldn’t make him wait another moment. When he pulled his fingers back to wipe them off on the towel, Gabriel groaned at the sudden lost. Crowley gave him a comforting pat on the hip.

“Roll over, big guy. You’re ready for me.”

Gabriel didn’t hesitate to roll onto his back. He let Crowley shift him around, his hips still propped up on the pillow. From this new position, he got to watch as Crowley pulled out a strange little foil packet and ripped it open with his teeth. He was about to work it down the length of his cock before Gabriel stopped him.

“What is that?” he asked. He’d seen one before, when he certainly hadn’t been stalking Crowley, but he didn’t really _know_.

“It’s a condom,” Crowley said. “Keeps things cleaner, you know? Hard work to clean up if you don’t use one, and it helps protect from disease and stuff. Though, I guess you and I don’t really get diseases, do we? Clean up is good, though. I always find it dulls things a bit, but—”

“No,” Gabriel said. “I don’t want that.”

“You… don’t?” Crowley asked, unsure.

“You used it with humans, so I don’t want it. We can clean up with a miracle, and I want to be able to feel you. All of you.”

“Right,” Crowley responded, trying to keep it together. He could have come just from that. “Let’s just square this off, then. You want me to come inside you, too?”

Gabriel nodded, sure of himself.

“Shit,” Crowley breathed. “You’re going to be the death of me, Romeo.”

“I would appreciate if you didn’t die. You promised to make love to me.”

Crowley snorted, but he nodded. He’d sort out the semantics later. For the moment, he had Gabriel in front of him—literally, the angel of his dreams. Gabriel’s thighs were spread apart, his hole wet, open, and dripping, and he looked so _willing_ , so ready. Gabriel wanted this, and Crowley wasn’t going to be the one to keep it from him. Not when he wanted it, too. He skipped the condom and went straight for the lube, spreading it down the length of his cock. Gabriel never took his eyes off him, watching each of Crowley’s movements, carefully.

Then, Crowley shifted himself closer, spreading Gabriel’s thighs out around him. He had one of Gabriel’s legs in his grasp, Gabriel’s knee up over his shoulder, and Crowley’s other hand was on his cock. He gave himself a few last strokes before guiding himself forward, rubbing the head of his cock over Gabriel’s hole. Gabriel shuddered in response, his hips twitching, his thighs trembling. Gabriel’s cock was fully hard, again, and straining against his stomach for a second release.

“You tell me if it hurts,” Crowley said. “If you want to stop at _any_ time, tell me.”

Gabriel nodded. He gripped his hands into the pillows and threw his head back, moaning when Crowley finally breeched him. Crowley’s press was slow, steady, and he kept a hand on Gabriel’s hips to keep him still while he eased forward. Gabriel forgot to breathe, again, so overwhelmed with the feeling of it. The stretch, the slick—Gabriel could barely contain himself as every nerve in his body went off, at once. He could feel that coiling warmth building back up in his stomach, but he didn’t want this to end. He never wanted this to end.

He was afraid of what would happen if it ended.

When Crowley’s hips were flush against him, he stilled. He let Gabriel’s leg back down, where his thighs rested around Crowley’s waist, and bent over Gabriel to smooth his hands over his face, back through his hair. Gabriel’s entire face was red, and he was panting heavily—once his breath had come back to him. But he’d never looked more perfect, Crowley thought. This was a look that belonged to him, and he would do everything to keep it that way.

Crowley waited just a second longer, until Gabriel was shifting and squirming beneath him. Then, Crowley pulled his hips back and snapped them forward. The resounding groan came directly from Gabriel’s throat, and Crowley shuddered on top of him. _This_ was what he’d been waiting for, what they’d both been waiting for. Gabriel wrapped his arms around Crowley’s shoulders when Crowley started to move, again, and they pressed closer together to kiss.

Their bodies rocked together, moving in the same rhythm, while they kissed. There was tongue, again, shifting and moving, their hips working. It was an overwhelming expanse of feelings, and Gabriel lost himself in it. He had to pull away just to breathe, to gasp as Crowley’s hips snapped into him. Crowley would stop just to grind their hips together, and Gabriel would work his hips down at the same time. Crowley had said he’d teach him to dance, and that was exactly what this felt like.

Gabriel found purchase on Crowley’s shoulders, dragging his nails down Crowley’s back with every thrust forward, each time their skin slapped together. Gabriel’s jaw was dropped open with his pleasure, and Crowley’s brow was scrunched up in return. They were breathing together, moving together, _being_ together. Whenever they could kiss, they did, but the longer it went on, the more uncoordinated they got. The harder it was. The more Crowley’s hips stuttered.

Crowley pulled back to brace himself on Gabriel’s hips, fucking into him with a renewed fervor. Gabriel spread his legs open wider, and with the new angle, every brush of Crowley’s cock rubbed right into Gabriel’s prostate. His entire body trembled with the pleasure of it, a sudden and grasping warmth over him. It doubled when Crowley grabbed his cock and started to jerk him off, in time with the rush of his hips. Gabriel was helpless to do anything but take it, his fingers dug into the pillows and the sheets near his head.

“Come on,” Crowley whispered. “Come for me, Gabriel.”

Gabriel closed his eyes tightly and listened to Crowley. He could feel every drag of Crowley’s cock, every rough thrust forward. Crowley rubbed over his walls, hitting his prostate, and every movement pulled more and more pleasure out of Gabriel, had him alight with _feeling_ and everything. His hips were working themselves down over Crowley’s cock. Everything mounted all at once, and Gabriel found himself shouting with his second orgasm of the night.

When he came down from his high, Crowley had gone still. Crowley was still inside of him, still holding his hips, but he wasn’t moving. He was just looking at Gabriel, regarding him with such a softness that Gabriel hadn’t seen in thousands of years. But that wouldn’t distract Gabriel from what he already knew had happened—or, more accurately, what hadn’t happened.

“You didn’t finish,” Gabriel said. “Keep going.”

“Gabriel—”

Gabriel wrapped his legs tightly around Crowley’s waist, locking his ankles. “I said _keep going_. I told you to come inside of me.”

Crowley answered with the snap of his hips. Having just come, everything just felt _heightened_. Gabriel found himself sensitive, like he could feel every ridge of Crowley’s cock as he fucked into him. Gabriel clenched down around him; the pleasure was almost too much for him to take, but he held on, for Crowley’s sake. He rolled his hips down, held Crowley tightly between his thighs, and reached out for him. Crowley fell into his arms, helpless, and wrapped Gabriel up in his hold.

“Crowley,” Gabriel gasped. “I didn’t tell you this before. I have to tell you now.”

Crowley grunted in return, more focused on his growing need to finish than he was anything else, but he was listening.

“Crowley.” Gabriel said just his name, cupping Crowley’s face in his hands. “I love you, too.”

All at once, Crowley came with a sharp groan, a sharp jerk of his hips. Gabriel shuddered as he felt it, Crowley coming inside of him, filling him up. It was unlike anything he’d ever known, a strange rush of warmth through him. Crowley’s hips seemed to move on their own, right up until the very second that he was finished. And then, when Gabriel had lost the strength to keep his legs around Crowley’s waist, they both went and rather collapsed.

They didn’t stay like that for long. Crowley eventually found the strength to push himself up and pull out, which left Gabriel trembling, again. He was overly sensitive, messy, and exhausted. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d actually been exhausted. Not in the way like he was, then, with this bone-deep tiredness coursing through him. He wished he wasn’t tired, because he wanted to do nothing more than take Crowley back into his arms and welcome him back inside.

“That was something,” Crowley mumbled, collapsing down on the bed beside Gabriel.

“I want to do it again,” Gabriel said, but his _voice_. His voice sounded so wrecked and broken, like it wasn’t his. His throat was sore, too.

“Yeah, we can. Just, not now. You’re exhausted, and we need to get cleaned up.”

“I told you that we could just use a miracle.”

“Sure, but don’t you want to experience it? Just once? I’ll run us a nice warm bath,” Crowley leered, running his fingers over Gabriel’s chest. “I’ll clean you up nice and proper. We can wash each other, dry off. The bed will be all put back together, nice for sleeping.”

“Sleeping?” Gabriel asked. “I don’t usually sleep.”

“You’ll enjoy it. Let me go start the bath, okay? Join me when you’re ready.”

Gabriel didn’t think he’d ever be ready to get up, but after the water stopped running, he thought he might as well give it a try. Crowley had some of that demonic strength in him, but that didn’t mean he’d be up for using it to carry Gabriel to the bath. The only problem was, when Gabriel pulled himself out of bed, his knees buckled beneath him and he nearly fell. He managed to catch himself on the wall, and Crowley was there a second later.

Crowley came to his side and helped steady Gabriel with an arm around his waist, Gabriel’s arm around his shoulders. It took a moment to get Gabriel steadied, but he eventually had most of his weight leaning over for support.

“I don’t feel right,” Gabriel commented.

“It’s normal. First time and all,” Crowley assured. “You’ll get used to it.”

Crowley helped Gabriel into the bathroom and then into the tub. Crowley had this large, marvelous, black marbled tub. It was large enough for the both of them to spread out on their own, but Gabriel settled down in Crowley’s lap. They did just as Crowley had described: Crowley did his best to clean Gabriel out, but they did eventually just use a miracle to finish the job; they took turns washing each other, and it was the least sensual thing Crowley had ever experienced—he was pretty sure Gabriel had never tried bathing, either; and then, when they were out of the bath, Crowley took special time to dry Gabriel off.

Then, it was time for bed. Even if Gabriel was going to insist that he wasn’t tired and he didn’t sleep, Crowley had still miracled him up a set of pajamas. They were silken, lavender pajamas with his name embroidered into the breast pocket, because Crowley was a sucker for details. If Gabriel had initials, that’s what would have been there, but _Archangel Fucking Gabriel_ didn’t seem like a very nice thing to embroider anywhere.

“Are you sure?” Gabriel did eventually ask. Crowley was dressed up in his matching set of silken, black pajamas and just about ready to crawl into bed.

“Sure about what?” he asked.

“That you want me to sleep with you.”

“Positive. Get your arse in the bed, let’s go, Romeo.”

Gabriel frowned, but he did exactly that. He wormed his way beneath the covers and the sheets and rested his head down on a pillow. He and Crowley were facing each other, and still, Gabriel was shocked when Crowley reached out for him. Crowley put his hand on Gabriel’s cheek, a gentle pat, and leaned in to kiss him, chaste and quick.

It didn’t take long for Crowley to go to sleep, but Gabriel found it difficult. It wasn’t something that he knew how to do, and there were plenty of things to keep him awake. Thinking back on the night was one of those things, as Gabriel struggled to make sense of anything that had happened. The more he thought about it, the less sense it made that they’d come this far. By all rights, things should have ended poorly. Crowley should still hate him, and Gabriel shouldn’t have ever come. But he had. And maybe Crowley didn’t hate him.

Too good to be true. All of it was too good to be true. Lying there in bed with Crowley seemed like something that Gabriel should have never been able to do. Like it was all a dream, and if he fell asleep, he’d wake up at his desk in Heaven. He was too afraid to fall asleep, afraid of what the reality would be. But he was exhausted. If he had to wake up alone, in Heaven, then this would still have been an experience he could remember forever. Eventually, Gabriel drifted off against his will.

Come morning, when Gabriel woke up, he was entirely alone in the bed. The only comforting thing about it was that the sheets beside Gabriel were still warm. It meant that Crowley hadn’t been gone long, but it also meant that, despite the size of Crowley’s bed, he’d spent the entire night pressed up, close to Gabriel. Too good to be true, Gabriel reminded himself. It was all too good to be true, and he wasn’t sure what to do with himself. This was Crowley’s flat; it didn’t feel right to just start wandering around.

Maybe that was what Crowley wanted. He’d gotten up early so Gabriel wouldn’t see him and take the hint to just be on his way. He should have known that everything was too good to be true. Crowley had said whatever he needed to get a quick lay out of him, and now he was trying to get Gabriel to leave without having to be the one to send him out the door. Gabriel didn’t even have to use the door. He could just disappear, and Crowley could come back to an empty room. It would serve him right.

Only, Gabriel didn’t have the chance to even get up. He’d pushed himself up to his elbows, but then Crowley was walking through the door with a tray in his hands. A silver tray, no less, holding a plate of food and two mugs of what smelled like sweet coffee. Gabriel didn’t eat food. He’d _never_ eaten food, and Crowley should have known that. Crowley didn’t really eat, either, but still, he set the tray down on the nightstand like everything was fine.

“Thought you might like to try some,” Crowley said. “I know it’s not your thing, but maybe just once. You might need the extra help to get back into shape, hm? Wild night.”

“I can still leave,” Gabriel said, and that caught Crowley off guard.

“What?”

“If you want me too. I know the promise was that if you didn’t remember, I would go. But I can still leave.”

“But I made pancakes,” Crowley said. He picked the plate off the silver tray and held it up, where Gabriel could see the pancakes done up with little halo designs in them.

Gabriel just looked at him.

“I know you don’t eat, but I thought it would be fun to try. I—do you want to leave?” Crowley asked, then, setting the pancakes aside.

“I thought you’d want that.” Gabriel finally sat up, shifting so that the sheets were tight around his waist.

“Did I do something to make you think that?” Crowley collapsed to sit on the bed. “I knew I was going to do thing wrong, but I didn’t think I’d do them _that_ wrong.”

Gabriel shook his head. “After everything that happened, it just seemed like something you would still want.”

“You mean after the part where I said _I love you_ and held you all night? Gabriel, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing is wrong. This just all feels like it’s too good to be true. I don’t want to get comfortable just for something to go wrong.”

“Things are going to go wrong,” Crowley said, like a promise. “But that’s half of what a relationship is. I thought I made it pretty clear that I wanted to try. The whole, _nobody I_ _’d rather figure it out with_?”

Gabriel didn’t respond. Crowley, in turn, reached out for Gabriel and wrapped their hands together.

“Do you not want to try?” Crowley grimaced.

“I do. If you still want to.”

Crowley slipped in closer. “More than anything, Gabriel. It’s taken this long to get you back; I’m not going to send you off so soon. There’s so much to do, now.”

Gabriel hadn’t a single clue of what that meant, or all the things that they could do. He was sure Crowley would be able to lead them through that, that he would show Gabriel all of the human things that he didn’t understand. There were still questions that needed to be answered: how would they balance this with Gabriel’s work in heaven; would Crowley be alright with an Archangel partner; would Gabriel finally Fall for this? They were questions that would only have answers, in time.

There were some things just as certain as those questions were looming. Crowley had forgiven Gabriel, and Gabriel had forgiven him. They had a future, just as sure as any of it was. If that future meant Falling or moving in together or whatever other crazy scheme Crowley could cook up, then fine. Gabriel had never felt closer to _home_ than he did at that moment, still in Crowley’s bed with steaming pancakes, coffee, and Crowley sitting right beside him.

**Author's Note:**

> 𓆏 Froge Bounces 𓆏  
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